Prospect Park
by girlville
Summary: This carries on from my first fic "The Twelfth Year". This is a post Major Case tale.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N This is my second work of fan fiction. I have decided to make it a follow on from my first one "The Twelfth Year." This is a different kind of story because I wanted to flesh out the world I had created the first time around. I also wanted to write about family life and that can be a little less linear and a little more indulgent (in a good way I hope). There are elements of romance, drama and crime in this story. Again this is an M fiction but not at first, so give it a chance.**

* * *

In a busy city, on a busy street, there sat an historical brownstone, a beautiful renaissance revival rowhouse built circa 1891. On the third floor, the top floor, through the window set farthest to the left, Alexandra Goren née Eames sat on an office chair (lime green, the swiveling kind with an ergonomic design). She looked past neighbouring rooflines to the world beyond and tucked one lean bare leg beneath her. An arched elegant foot touched down to pivot on that stem, working the seat slowly from side to side, side to side. She felt itchy, twitchy, _bothered_ but she didn't rise or wriggle. Alex had mastered her frenetic energies long ago. After all this time, after years of behaviour modification she was good, very good, but not perfect. A heavy loaded breath tumbled past her lips.

"Just 16.5 more minutes." he rumbled catching the sound and raising his eyes. She smiled because he knew her so well and because 16.5 was perfectly strange, just the way she liked him.

"Why not .8?" she shot out teasingly.

"Now you're just being silly." he said scribbling something fiercely on his notepad.

"Okay fine, we leave this room together in 16.5 minutes."

"15.8 now."

"Agh…" she groan-laughed-groaned. She was married to a comedian.

Robert Goren, formerly Detective Robert Goren of the New York Police Department - Major Case Squad, sat across from her. He was a tornado of mental energy yet from the outside looking in he was remarkably like her in disposition. This mirroring (was that the psychological term?) was undeniably a holdover from another life, a life when cracking the case had meant being completely in sync. And reading her in an instant - his partner come wife - that was a holdover too. He had a scale for weight of her breath, a protractor for the tilt of her head, an equation for size of her eyes. It wasn't a parlour trick (though he was very good at those) for them it was visceral.

"Well, pass me that pen." she gestured fluttering a hand in his direction.

"What's wrong with yours?"

She scribbled colourless angry spirals. And held up the sheet "That's why."

He reluctantly placed his silver Pelikan fountain pen (and a warning) in her palm. "Don't lose it."

"Trusts me with his life, his child, a mortgage, but not a pen." she mumbled snatching it from him.

And this intimate vignette was in the city. Yes, this was New York, but not quite the cloying, crowded life in the valley of skyscrapers that they had lived and breathed for years. This was Brooklyn, Park Slope, 17 minutes west, and a few stop signs south of her brother, and a glorious 25 second walk to Prospect Park. They could almost touch the towering old oaks from their front step.

Bobby and Alex had searched high and low for months for a gem on the island of Manhattan. That was where they'd _thought_ they wanted to be, in a fixer or half of a duplex or something that could trim a handful of minutes off their respective commutes, but alas, they were priced out. And the places they could have gotten into bidding wars over were no places to raise a child. All they could afford were the up and comers, the barely gentrified factories and reclaimed public housing, places with very little green space and a whole lot of dodgy.

And there'd been another _issue_ back then on their search for a place to call home. A very unique _issue_ to this tall strapping man and his diminutive pregnant wife. Because of this _issue_ they had run through 4 real estate agents before finding someone that could tolerate their 'quirks'. The _issue_ was that every single neighbourhood they'd visited recalled their bloody past.

The city was a crime scene.

It was always the same, they would get a call about some glorious condo that had always 'just gone on the market.' Optimistically they would rush over, because the good ones never lasted more then 72 hours. They'd round some corner, onto some anonymous concrete avenue and then Alex would freeze and her hand would fall to her tummy and she'd say something like:

"Oh God Bobby not here remember the Pearson case?" or "Forget it, bad mojo. All I see is Candon lying there on the sidewalk blown away."

Alexandra Goren was not particularly squeamish. Normally her gore threshold was very high but these were not normal times. Eventually Bobby sat her down and in his most tender tone told her that she was in the throes of some nesting hysteria. And that her obsession with the safety and wellbeing of their child was going leave them homeless. And because truths (especially those told to heavily pregnant women) had consequences, he'd slept on the couch that night.

But the next day had dawned with new clarity. And they'd sat down and decided firmly on Park Slope. Remembering with that kind of smooth, affectionate nostalgia (because time had planed away all the bumps and edges) all the Thanksgivings and Christmases they'd spent at Will's house and how impressed they'd been by his little slice of nature butted up against the city. They remembered stately houses and tree lined streets. They remembered children happily screaming as they ran scantily clad and breathless through sprinklers or kicked at crispy piles of fallen leaves. And they knew from research that some of the best public schools in New York lived there. And really, they reasoned, it couldn't hurt to have family nearby (in a pinch). Best of all, by their recollection the only case they'd ever had near Park Slope had been about 10 blocks north in Prospect Heights, the Iberra case, and that psycho was in prison, 25 to life. Perfect.

With the neighbourhood set in stone, there had been nothing but to wait. And wait they had, for forty three days. Marking that tense time by counting new worry lines and the added inches around Alex's abdomen. Worry because they had sold their (her) home and closing loomed. But they weren't the sorts to compromise, not just any place would do, they had a list. Their detailed housing criteria was as follows: renovated, character, condo not cooperative, two bedrooms, over 1000 square feet, on, or in proximity to green space. And the kicker they had to have a room (or a nook or an alcove) to call office, that much was non-negotiable. Their agent Susan had tangled her fingers in her red pixie hairdo and pulled hard when they'd said that. Non-negotiable. An agent's greatest foe.

"You two could push the bounds of anyone's good nature." she grumbled mildly.

They both bit their tongues and resisted the urge to say: _**We have**_.

Instead they'd looked at her with genuine relief because they had already profiled her ginger bluster and they knew she was going to stick it out, not cut and run. "Thank you Susan." They said in unison.

Eventually (on an early summers day) Susan had found their apartment, the perfect apartment, and they'd gotten it for a song. But a song in New York was a very different kind of melody. In New York you didn't get a house and a big backyard and more square footage then you could handle. In New York, like Bobby and Alex, you got a renovated 1087 square foot flat, with 2 bedrooms and 2 baths and private rooftop access (called a terrace in real estate vernacular). It was quite a perk for 3rd floor residents like them. A perk designed, no doubt, to offset the reality of all those stairs. Because even dreams come true had stone cold truths. It was a walk-up, their perfect place. Every arrival and departure a vertical battle and these days it was always with a baby or a stroller or groceries or just weary uncooperative legs (with each lift Bobby chanted in his head: **_This is making you healthy_**). And a song in New York meant your agent worked the seller down to just a whisper under the 1 million dollar mark.

A million dollars.

**_1 million dollars!_**

Alex could hardly believe this was their life.

But it was.

They were really here, doing this, together.

They had crunched the numbers. And run the software (the sophisticated calculators that happily told you what you were worth on planet earth) using piles of bills and bank statements, factoring every credit and debit and as it turned out just under 1 million dollars was doable for her and Bobby. Their combined annual income - salaries, his pension, her spousal death benefits - was over third that. And they were sitting on a nice little pot from the advantageous sale of her condo.

With Alex at the helm of the chequebook (Bobby'd surrendered that task without a fight) they'd even managed to squirrel away a small financial cushion for the worst case scenario. But there wasn't going to be a worst case, because they were thriving. They were both on fire, as they'd always been together. There was passion. They were both flexing new muscles. They were both garnering new respect. And they were both alive with the mental stimuli of new challenges at work.

No they weren't detectives anymore.

But this was so much better.


	2. Chapter 2

_**"This apartment is awesome." Bobby said the day they moved in, they were on the couch sprawled and breathless and a little shell-shocked. Around them the room looked like an ocean of chaos with boxes and bags, haphazardly folded linens, rolled up rugs and a toaster, a shiny red toaster, that for some reason wasn't in the kitchen but was winking up at them from the centre of the living room.**_

_**"I'm glad you like it because now that we're in, we're never leaving." Alex quipped.**_

_**He chuckled shook his head. "Three storeys no elevator."**_

_**"Three storeys, no elevator and 6 movers."**_

_**She rubbed her belly. She wasn't far from bursting. At 7 and 3/4 months pregnant she'd been more choreographer than actual help during this move. She'd drawn up the game plan. She'd assigned roles to the movers. She'd designated the rooms where stuff needed to land by devising an elaborate colour coding system. And she had (in the dark of one night, while Bobby snored, while her hips were burning and while the baby was kicking the life out of her) created spreadsheets listing box contents beside corresponding box numbers.**_

_**Alex figured that they (she) were the most organized movers in the history of moving. It didn't hurt that she had been bored, B-O-R-E-D. And that planning (right down to the a cooler full of beverages she would offer the men) was a way to channel her enormous urge to do something. Now that she was on a leave from the NYPD - in the space between jobs and before motherhood - now that she was all talk and no action, this kind of task suited her. All the arbitrary paperwork she'd created had felt like home.**_

_**And when moving day had finally arrived she had woken up, showered, pulled on her "I'm making a human what have you done today?" t-shirt, fancy bejewelled maternity sweat pants, her Sketchers and a white baseball cap, then she'd cracked her swollen knuckles and been ready to manage. Alex was pent-up and just itching to boss someone around.**_

_**By 9am the movers had been dispatched to her place, and Bobby's storage unit (because they had been living together - on top of each other - for months in her 600 square feet). She'd managed to stagger the arrival of**__** two separate trucks**_ and they'd managed to not clog up the designated service stairwell.

_**Now they lay here proud and exhausted, it had been a true work of art pulling off this move.**_

_**"You okay?" Bobby asked from behind her on the couch. His eyes went to her belly, and then in short order his hands followed, cupping and caressing her, then sliding under her top and over the firm contour of her abdomen.**_

_**"Sooo tired." she said stretching out against him, feeling her muscles and joints creak as they released. "Mostly from running my mouth."**_

_**"You were a sight to behold." He said and she had been. Twice (hell, more than ten times) he paused and just stared because she awed him, so swollen yet so forceful and organized.**_

_**"We were paying them $35 dollars an hour, premium prices. Plus a second truck surcharge. I was just getting our money's worth."**_

_**Our.**_

_**Everything was our now.**_

_**To Bobby it felt so good to move through the world as part of an 'our'.**_

_**"I can't believe this is ours." he looked around his eye stopping on the big bay window, the fading evening light touched everything so kindly, making even the piles (hours of future unpacking) seem pretty.**_

_**"I know." She gave her head a shake but it wasn't a dream. This apartment was a gargantuan leap for both of them, not so much in size, although it was bigger then either of their old places respectively. No it was a leap in fixtures, in architectural detail, in history, and upgrades. And all the mod cons, all the pretty, sparkly luxuries that had once been for other people were now theirs.**_

_**On her back, as she was, Alex looked straight up. "10 foot ceilings."**_

_**"Hand carved oak fireplace." he played her game.**_

_**"Built in bookshelves." she turned and grinned up at him "Almost as if they knew you'd be here one day." Bobby tapped her cheeky nose with his index finger. Alex remembered hearing more than one breathy profanity today as the movers had brought 43 bankers boxes of his books up the three storeys.**_

_**"High gloss white cornice and base trim. 12 inches wide."**_

_**"Oh my God," she laughed "You measured didn't you?"**_

_**"I might have." he said bashfully "But just to make sure the agent wasn't embellishing."**_

_**"Well tell me something else." she cajoled. "Pull some more out of that big brain. You know you want to."**_

_**"Okay you little..." he kissed her crown "You asked for it. The front door has raised panels, egg-and-dart trim, dentil molding, and an elaborately decorated doorknob and escutcheon plate."**_

_**"That's it baby you know how your facts, and factoids, turn me on."**_

_**He lowered his voice, to a sexy whisper, "Brass butt hinges they were extremely popular in the late 1800s."**_

_**"More." she demanded with faux sexuality. "More."**_

_**"Intricate cast iron vent covers."**_

_**She sighed swoonily.**_

_**"Original hardwood floors stripped and re-stained."**_

_**"That is hot. I think I'm getting my second wind." she sat up and turned, a less than graceful move with a bit of rolling then a subtle inelegant struggle with balance, and finally managed to straddled his lap. "Still love me? Even with this enormous gut?" Alex leaned back on her haunches looking at her husband. He saw uncertainty in the furrow of her brow, so he pushed against those lines with his thumb.**_

_**"You loved me with mine." he said and his espresso eyes glowed.**_

_**She found herself adrift in the intensity of his gaze.**_

_**"You are beautiful. Gorgeous." he cupped her shoulders and though she never saw herself that way, from his lips she believed every word. **__**"This life we're making Alex." his voice almost caught, "It's more than I ever dreamed of."**_

* * *

So they settled in and now they were here, _living_. With Bobby's mid-century-modern design sensibilities juxtaposed against the old, heavily ornate, hand carved, bygone era details of the apartment. It was beautiful and unique and warm.

But this room where they sat today, was for work, hard and heavy and endless. Alex looked around their home office, their new lifestyle came with a mess of papers and books and pens and pencils and laptops and ipads and cell phones and docking stations, and (her eye rested affectionately) baby monitors, always at arms reach.

Bobby looked at the clock "8 minutes and counting."

"Okay then. I'm packing up." She started to make order of the clutter in front of her.

"Nice and slow." he urged

She rolled her eyes.

It was a real luxury this room where they could both work. It was a luxury to have a 3rd bedroom at their desired price point anywhere in New York. But this wasn't a true third bedroom, the place would have been a hundred, two hundred thousand dollars more if it had been. No, the real estate blurb had called it a 'dayroom' it was light and bright with one window, and sat partially tucked into the negative space beneath the stairs and across from the front door.

Inside this room the only means of privacy was a floating partition wall. A divider set up by some ingenious previous owner to block the chaos while still liberating the light. And it worked. An irrepressible golden glow spilled into the adjacent rooms. But on the other hand, as walls went, it fell short of it's duty, stopped short of creating a truly enclosed space. So the couple that lived here filled the gaps with baby gates and boxes it was a bit makeshift but (mostly) kept little hands out of trouble.

There were some universal laws at play in this Prospect Park apartment, ones about crap (the useless byproduct of life) multiplying, others about little children wanting what they weren't supposed to have. And some days, to Alex, all the cleaning and organizing, well, it felt like fighting the tides. But no, they were so very lucky to have this dedicated workspace.

At least once a day they tucked into their vintage metal (Goodwill) desks which, not coincidentally, had been pushed together, back to back and then floated in the centre of the room. Bobby and Alex had found (after a lot a furniture shuffling) that this was the way they worked best. It was 1PP all over again. Somewhere along the way it had gotten into their blood. Glancing up from dog-eared pages and into each others eyes was inspiration. And the clang of a knocked knee on metal felt like a warm hug.

In this home office they worked like detectives again.


	3. Chapter 3

"Time. Time!" he tapped his hands in a refs T.

"What nooooow?" she dragged out the words like a petulant child.

"I want 4 minutes added for accidental daydreaming."

"Accidental what? Oh give me a break." Alex rolled her eyes.

"I was dreaming about you." he said sweetly, "Can I have my minutes back now?"

"Okay. Fine. Since you asked so nicely."

"Back to 8 minutes?"

And like a good office hostage with a touch of Stockholm syndrome she nodded.

They were both academics now. Well, he really was one, she only felt like one, more likely to get a papercut these days then see any gun fire. It was Bobby that had proposed she play this new gig as captain less like head cop and more like an innovator. Using templates and ideas. There was nothing he loved better then to slip her a text he had bookmarked or to email her an article about something they were doing in Norway (or some such place).

It was a bit revolutionary. The classic captain being a surly, closed off, agoraphobic _man_ that only left his cave for meetings, photo ops and community events he had to attend. None of those descriptors fit Alex, so she was reading up on criminological theory. She'd beefed up the cyber division, making social media a source for gathering intelligence and a way to present a kinder gentler police department to the public. Being married to Robert Goren was definitely making her more cerebral.

Alex liked the 34th. It had been a rough start, gaining respect, finding her personal rhythm, learning all the processes. And even harder going home and gearing up for another day after hearing a cabal of uni's laughing that "The old ball and chain wants us to…" or another idiot complaining about "Taking orders from a piece of ass…" They had denied it, but she knew. Alex's skin was pretty much shoe leather after all this time. She wasn't taking any shit in a bid to be liked (not that she ever had) but now it was actually part of her morning pep talk.

There had been a lot of buzz about her during her 6 month reign negative and positive. Alex had done her research before bidding for top spot at the 34th, she had known that cops were trending less toward the captain promotion because it was a bitch, all time and energy and accountability with a marginal pay bump. And she'd known that 'they' (the Brass) liked to use stats to rake captains over the coals. But it wasn't until her first debriefing that she realized that a Captain was middle management plain and simple. There was no glamour here at her precinct. She was an accountant, a warden, a sounding board and sometimes a punching bag. But she was the ambitious sort, and having her double bars, and that laurel and crown on her badge, they soothed her.

Her eyes were open now. Open to the limitations and the problems hidden from her as a detective. Open to all the systemic failures inside the NYPD. "An old bitch gone in the teeth." How apt. She almost laughed out loud at the memories … Hudson University, Ezra Pound, Nicole Wallace… Pound had called it almost a century ago with his critique on civilization. The NYPD was a microcosm of that civilization, a struggling structure with festering problems, gender inequity, racism and people fighting and dying to uphold something that in her opinion desperately needed an overhaul. And she realized now (too late) that the whole flawed system rested far too heavily on the shoulders of its captains. She was finally starting to appreciate the conflicted look she'd seen in her superior's eyes, Deakins, Ross, Hannah. They'd been carrying the weight of the world.

But it did get her thinking. Thinking big.

Maybe she would be a change agent.

Maybe she wouldn't stop at captain.

* * *

And him? Well, Bobby was Bobby. He was still performing his agile dance, simultaneously wowing and flipping off the world.

The first day on his new job he'd come home quietly only a slamming door and the clang of keys marking his arrival.

"How'd it go?" she'd asked him.

He'd shrugged.

She'd raised her eyebrows. "Very articulate."

"My throat is dry from all the talking." he'd mumbled collapsing onto the couch and staring blindly. She'd sat beside him, right up against him thigh to thigh and fixed her eyes on the roughly the same spot.

"Is this going to work out Bobby?"

"The lead soprano has a sore throat." he'd said.

"Is that a riddle? Or did they break you?"

That made him smile, he'd rubbed an absent hand along her leg. "It's going to work. It was good. I was the headliner. I told them I'm going to need a raise - throat lozenge pay."

"You didn't say that."

"Of course I did."

She'd looked at him slowly and then just shook her head. "Give it a week before you get fired."

Some things never changed, he was still speaking awkward truth to power. And he was was always strategizing. Only now he was thinking of how to deliver his lectures with the most impact. He'd plugged right into the FBI skipping up through the internal ranking system because of time in and commensurate experience. Bobby was a GS 13 grade, a civilian supervisory role. Looking at him Alex almost sensed he was born for this. Born to be left alone to think and then share the masses of information. Even as a cop he'd always been one part doddering professor. He did miss the action a bit, and he did occasionally reach for a non-existent weapon, but they still made it to the range and he'd been asked into the field twice in the two months he'd been teaching.

For his classes, he was bound by curriculum to some degree, but he had a career full of anecdotes and the chops. And he was always drawing on the information in old case files. **_Old casefiles._** He had kept transcripts, photos, hand scribbled notes and a file folder (fat or thin) on just about every case they'd investigated. That was hundreds of cases. And it was all on paper. _**They were drowning in paper.**_

So they shared space with two towering (unattractive) grey filing cabinets (that couldn't open fully without smacking a desk) and not one but two bookshelves laden with thick heavy texts, books with sexy titles that set a girl's heart aflutter like: 'Encyclopedia of Statistics in Behavioral Science' and 'Criminal Profiling and the Homology Assumption.'

But they were still a team. Collaborating endlessly even from across the divide of different jobs. Because professionally they were twins, two peas in a pod with the same experiences, the same drives, the same recollections.

Bobby and Alex, each still the other's greatest asset.


	4. Chapter 4

"You have exactly 57 seconds, then you're on your own." she said sternly. They had promised that they always would leave this room together, but if every once in a while _always_ was too tall an order, in that case they would always go to bed together. And that was a firm promise.

"I'm done." He said bringing two large hands down hard on the desktop. Even in the fading light they had quite a view, a green vista from up here. Sometimes he could imagine they weren't in the city with a view like this, but then the honking started and the crazed laughter and then without fail somebody would drop an f-bomb. "What do you want to do? Have anything in mind?" and she felt him undressing her, his eyes burning like hot coals.

His drives had been legendary at 1PP and they still were in this house, but now the only thing he wanted to consume was her. Regular as clockwork. Alex hoped he would never stop desiring her. But tonight she was restless. "I'm not sure." She plunged both hands deep into her blonde hair and winced, "I'm missing the single life." she confessed.

His eyebrows shot up and she realized how awful that sounded. "Sorry. I love this. I love us. I just meant going out on the spur of the moment, dinners in swanky restaurants, dancing. It's Friday night it's 8:07 and I'm yawning."

"You work hard." he leaned back bouncing testing out the springs of the chair. That was an understatement. Now that he could watch her objectively from outside the partnership he realized that his wife was dedicated, almost too much.

"Yeah. Maybe I should just be thankful I'm off tomorrow and sleep hard."

Tomorrow was mythical, like a unicorn, tomorrow was a Saturday and she didn't have to work. It would be her first Saturday off since she'd become captain of the 34th. Time was that a Saturday off meant a rowdy Friday night, apparently those days were over.

"We're not" he leaned in "cool anymore."

"I guess not." She wasn't sure if she'd ever been cool, not since her prom queen days, but she had been free, unencumbered, spontaneous. Now she was buried under the weight of responsibility. She wouldn't go back, not for anything, but every once in a while…

"Come with me." he stood abruptly sending his chair crashing into a filing cabinet and came around to take her hand.

"What are you up to?" She followed him down the short corridor to the open kitchen/living room and watched him move the coffee table up against one wall. Then she watched him push aside the "Playskool Busy Ball Popper" and then pick up an Elmo doll staring briefly into the googly eyes before dropping it into the storage ottoman. Then he took one bare foot and give a bright pink and white ride-on car a little kick and it sailed into the corner beside the couch hidden from view.

He smiled surveying the space he'd cleared, an open spot on their striped rug. Alex just leaned against the wall arms crossed frowning quizzically. He jogged lightly by her an index finger raised.

"Wait. One. More. Thing." Then he banged and slammed opening and closing cabinet doors with typical Goren indelicacy, and one by one placed a row of lit tealight candles along the quartz countertop. He emerged from the kitchen and added two more, one to each end table and hit the light switch. Immediately turning the room into a mysterious flickering place.

"And this." he pulled his phone from his pocket tapped a few invisible keys and planted it in it's base, immediately filling the room with soulful strains.

**_Ahhhhh, a classic Percy Sledge._**

"That was smooth." she gave credit where it was due.

"Thanks." he smiled and extended a hand which she took and he pulled her in close, closer then close. And they were silent for a long time.

"Dancing in the living room is kind of sexy." Alex whispered and let her hand slip low to his butt.

He huffed theatrically. "I am not a piece of meat."

He brought their clasped knotted fingers in the bow of his chest. He moved them around the room slowly, gliding so easily. For such a big guy, he sure could move. She wasn't half as effortless, but tucked into him the way she was, it really didn't matter. _**God he's a romantic.**_ She thought, the plaintive call of the singers voice drawing her in, about a man loving a woman, and it was punctuated by the tightening of his arms. Alex was completely swallowed by everything in that moment, the strength of him, the warmth of him, the scent of him - salty and sweet - the perfect snack. And then he was singing, just a little, just as a compliment, and he had a great voice. That was something she'd never known, not until they'd been intimate and she'd heard him in the shower. And she'd demanded to know why he'd kept it from her all those years.

"Murder and singing?" was all he'd said, making a face and she supposed he had a point, but now, well now she had all of him, every ounce. She closed her eyes as the song changed and as if some some magical DJ were steering the choices, the lyrics wove right into her most intimate thoughts. She had all of him. He had all of her. She moved closer if that was possible sighing softly.

"I'm not made of steel Alexandra." he joked quietly.

"Really?" she went up and down on her toes a few times rubbing against a hardening part of his anatomy. "Sure feels like you are."

"You tease."

And in a moment of perfect trust she let her head fall back, eyes still closed waiting patiently for his lips. Instead she felt his large hand cup her head and that scratchy gritty stubble all over her neck. She shivered. He knew she loved this, the pleasure pain from his 5 o'clock shadow, the warm red afterburn. It didn't really matter where he put it. Sometimes he'd work his face across her forearms, her breasts, her belly, the inside of her thighs…

"Oh Bobby." She moaned because she wanted him. Always. And hearing the sound of her surrender, inside him everything rushed and pushed and pulsed. It was how she said his name. It sounded like desire. It sounded like love. And knowing it was all for him, only him, was an aphrodisiac of the highest order.

She was wearing very little on this hot summer evening. His big hands grabbed her tank top and it was stretched and pulled, all misshapen and then gone. His thumb worked down under the layers of underwear and spandex shorts bunching them, scraping against the angular protrusion of her hip bone. Alex couldn't help but bring her hands to cover the new curves of her post baby body, the slight rounding of a once flat tummy, the more generous set of her thighs. But he bumped them away because he_ loved_ her flesh. He loved everything about it, the smell, the taste, the feel. She knew this about him. She'd squeal regularly as he grasped any wobbly bits, kneading and squeezing her like a soft pliable dough. Her softness was his heroin.

"Stop that." She was self-conscious even in the flattering candlelight.

"I can't." he murmured and she believed him. She was his compulsion. It was always like this with them, every single time. He wanted her a couple of times a day. He didn't always get her, mind you, but she said yes enough to wonder: Who was this woman so constantly ready? This Alex was like no version of herself she'd ever met. Being Bobby's wife had unleashed the primal feminine.

She would be lying in bed half asleep, having to work in the morning, just having breastfed or pumped and he would fling those enormous feelers in her general direction then he'd sweep her up, scoop her in beneath him.

She'd groan "Bobby I'm so tired."

And he'd say "So am I" but he'd push her nightgown up anyway, ruching the fabric around her waist. And she couldn't help but smile even in her dosey state.

And like tonight his hands would be everywhere, and her panties would disappear and he'd push his impressive member into her and just like that she'd engage, she would moisten and spread. She'd go from sleepy to sexual. She would dig her nails in and curl her legs around and let her pelvis crash and rub against his, clutching his back and ass between small fingers urging him. "Harder Bobby. Please harder."

But tonight there wasn't a nightgown or a bed, just candlelight and soft music contrasted by the cold edge of the stone countertop he'd pinned her to, it carved ogee shaped lines into the meat of her bum and legs. And then his black t-shirt was gone. And then he was kissing her wild and free. And she was kissing him as though she hadn't seen him in months, sucking then pecking, grinding then _eating_ his lips. And his cargo shorts and briefs puddled at his ankles. And then he let a knuckle slide between her lower lips before allowing himself follow. And, she thought, clinging and undulating and moaning, **_This is the best Friday night ever._**

Then (mid coitus) there was a rustling behind them and then a soft mewling. They fell out of rhythm for a moment, two sets of sex glazed eyes fixing on the baby monitor. Alex grabbed his chin turning him back to her with force, kissing him hard and wet. Because what he was doing to her wasn't optional anymore, she felt a naked thirst that needed to be slaked.

"She's fine. Keep going." Alex panted begging a little. And he did grunting, going up on his toes for leverage, bumping her, _lifting_ her with the force of his hips, and trying to ignore another more insistent tinny cry, until he couldn't.

"Immy, Immy…" he groaned slowing, letting go of Alex, planting his hands on either side of her hips feel the sobering chill through his palms, because he was losing it, losing momentum, losing girth.

"No. No!" Alex was fierce about this aggressive even."Mommy first." She coaxed him back again using her mouth to find the sweet spot just below his ear and her hands to find the sweet spot just below his ribs. She knew she'd done good when he jumped to attention inside her. He growled like a beast drowning out the more urgent cries of his daughter in favour of working his wife into an orgasmic frenzy, changing angle going more vertical, because he knew her sweet spots too. Wrapping her blonde locks around his fist because he also knew she liked a little pain. He moved until the sweat beaded and dripped into the hollow of his broad back.

"Almost…" Alex cried "Almost…" in the zone, on the cusp, and refusing to let her (now wailing) child rob her of what promised to be spectacular.

And then they were there, together. Simultaneous orgasm. It had never happened before, and it was absolutely exquisite, the background din and discord notwithstanding - or maybe enhancing - the waves of white hot psychedelic pleasure.

"Now she's gonna be pissed." Bobby laughed breathlessly collapsing against his wife and Alex cradled him sweaty and satisfied, draping her arms and legs over, around, his big masculine frame, feeling that telltale prickle in her breasts, her milk, her letdown. And she marveled at her own body going from lover to mother in an instant.

"Better her then me." Alex laughed breathily, "That was amazing." she whispered into his ear as he limply slide from inside her.

The cries increased in their momentum, spurring Alex from her reverie. But she didn't rush, secure in the knowledge that this was not an S.O.S. She knew her baby daughter's voice, she could crack the subtle shifts in pitch like a code breaker, at first it'd been: 'I want you,' then, 'I want you now', and now she was howling 'how dare you!'

"I'll get her." Bobby found the strength to straighten away and tug his shorts back into place.

"No, she'll think it's playtime." She stopped him short and slid off the counter, slipping back into her lacy blue panties tugging at her bra to cover her exposed nipple. He grabbed her as she moved past.

"What?" she looked up at him.

"Nothing." He slapped her ass 'sending' her on her way.

Alex frowned. **_Sexual politics._ **For so long he'd taken it from her because she'd been the senior partner. But now that title was up for grabs. And there was a subtle power struggle, so subtle if you blinked you might miss it.

Bobby and Alex, they also played the best mind games.


	5. Chapter 5

The nursery was hot and dark.

**_So that's what all this crying is about._**

Imogen was screeching now, she was standing grasping the headrail of the crib and yowling. The infant normally slept through the night but the window in the nursery was wide open. Alex stopped and stared for a 10 beat. She hadn't left it that way, she wouldn't have, the air conditioning was on. **_Bobby! _**She railed silently. He was always leaving windows open, he said he liked to smell the city**_. _**

Her daughter was mottled and red and steadily going hoarse with rage. Alex picked up her irate little bundle. Then moved them over and slammed the heavy glass pane shut, locking it. Immediately she felt a rush of cool air eddy and break over them.

"Is that better sweetheart?" Alex cooed pressing her face to her child's, checking for the clammy warmth she suspected. Then she lay the baby down gently and began unsnapping to remove an impressively swollen diaper. Bare little legs, pale in the moonlight, kicked fitfully. **The fastest recovery ever documented** Alex thought as the child twisted at the torso, trying to make a daring escape off he edge of the change table. "It's not playtime, silly. You should be sleeping." Alex chastised softly, "But I think you know that. Uh huh, I think you do." She singsonged kissing the soles of each little foot, remembering...

_**Her age had been the topic de jour during this entire pregnancy, but week a before her planned section and after much consideration Alex had gone to the mat for her daughter.**_

_**"No c-section. I want to go natural." She announced. Well, not completely natural. If she needed pain management she would accept it, but she wanted to try a vaginal again as she had with Nate.**_

_**"The doctor says…" **_

_**She'd cut Bobby off **__**"I know I was there. 'Schedule a cesarean and we'll see how it goes.'" Alex mimicked her OB's concerned voice "That was before, b**__**ut now she's turned and**_ I can give it a shot." The baby wasn't breach anymore. 

_**His brow furrowed. **_

_**"Women've been doing this for centuries. My body knows what to do." She hoped it did anyway. She hoped those crunches she spent so much time doing **__**pre-pregnancy **_would pay off. All this 'old' talk was really doing number on her head. Alex had never considered her age a factor in any activity or choice until now.

_**"I know but I'm worried." Bobby rubbed the back of his neck.**_

_**"You have my permission to cover your eyes or faint or whatever it is that men do." Alex loved playing the tough chick. Almost as much as Bobby loved drawing out her **_**_femininity._**

**_"How about I just hold your hand and tell you how much I love you." She blushed, actually blushed because he was a manipulative little so and so. God, he could work her to whatever devious ends he wanted. Robert Goren was a sweet talker. _**

**_In the end she had won the battle (completely by accident). _****_She'd woken up that very night, August 15th, ten full days before her official due date at 1am clutching her aching abdomen on sopping sheets. At first she had been mortified, sniffing them, afraid this was an embarrassing bladder issue. But it wasn't._**

**_"Bobby." she whispered, "Holy shit Bobby." she gave his shoulder a good rough push. He slept like a rock, in fact his back was wet and still he slept on. _****_"Bobby!" she burst out trying (and failing) to tamp rising hysteria._**

**_To his credit once he was awake he was a machine. That was one benefit to being so well read. Bobby had every eventuality mapped out inside that considerable cranium. She didn't need to explain why they had both taken a bath in bed and she didn't need to do a thing. Her clothes were laid out, her bag had been packed (for days). He helped dress her, then himself and then in a burst of adrenaline he had carried (or levitated) her down three stories and they were on their way to New York Methodist Hospital. Through it all nary a word had passed between them, save her little snarks,_**

**_"Wow you can get a bra off but not on." or "Tonight on live at 11 pregnant woman tossed down three stories by clumsy husband." And he kissed her hair and tightened his hold because he knew she was scared. She was trembling and every barb was her way of saying thank you._**

**_She reclined a bit listlessly in the car. And he rested his hand on that familiar tummy just in time to feel it buck and distort and hear her whimper with pain. _**

**_"This is really happening." he said because 'the tummy' as they called it, was almost an entity all it own. Of course they cooed to the baby girl they knew was inside, but they had become comfortable speaking about the whole process in euphemism:_**

**_'the tummy needs food.'_**

**_'the tummy is angry tonight.'_**

**_'the tummy just won't settle down.'_**

**_Now like some _****_sci-fi creation the tummy was about to spawn (too harsh?) expel it's true master (and little did those two naive souls know, theirs as well). While intellectually Bobby and Alex had understood for months that they were going to be parents, driving down a dark Prospect Park West, with her intermittently wracked with pain, and him white knuckling the steering wheel, well this was the moment that shit got real.  
_**

**_Alex dug her nails into the back of his hand in pain "Damn right this is happening." _**

**_The hospital was a 15 minute walk from their brownstone but a stroll was out of the question tonight and because Bobby forced himself to observe stop signs and red lights, it felt like they they would never get there, it felt like they were chasing the bloody building around the city. Bobby didn't allow himself to breathe until Alex was tucked into a bed in a private room and the resident on-call had made the obligatory joke _****_about how 'this little one wasn't going to wait for a scheduled cesarean.' Jokes were good Bobby thought, unconsciously wringing his hands. Jokes meant calm, sanity, levity._**

**_He pulled out his cell and called her sister. Not because he was so in tune with the rituals and customs of a traditional family. But rather because _****_between contractions Alex had the presence of mind to bark "Call my sister."_**

**_Liz wouldn't make it all the way from Connecticut in time, but Bobby set the cellphone down on the bedside table (on speaker) because that was what his wife wanted. That was how entwined her heart was with her sister's, even if Liz was on a highway somewhere Alex wanted to hear her voice and she wanted to allow Liz to hear the unvarnished sounds of labour and pain and joy. _**

**_Bobby wouldn't lie, that was very odd to him. But after all this time he went along. And he felt grateful, grateful for the knowledge. E_****_ach day he was lucky enough to be with Alex _**his **_understanding of the ties that bind deepened. This was what a real family looked like._**

**_"Not your brother?" he'd asked because Will was very close by. _**

**_"Sure him too, but…" _**

**_"But what?"  
_**

**_ "Too much testosterone." she admitted on another wave of distress. And he barely had time to do that when everything went into overdrive. The tone changed and the pain grew more intense and her breath was harsh and words were scarce. And then at her lowest she called for him, begged for him to hold her. And no sooner had he taken his place against her, as someone called that the "head was engaged" and there was the clank and rattle of tools and tables and the staff fell into formation and Alex just needed one good "oomph" to propel that small slippery, gunk caked, rouge parcel into the world. And as convention dictated soon Bobby was hacking through grey fleshy cord with a too small pair of scissors. In retrospect, that moment had been a confusion of sharp lights, commanding voices and gurgling nausea. It had been a fast and _****_awkward introduction into a fast and awkward world. _**

**_"6lbs 7oz." the doctor announced._**

**_"Liz?" Alex called to her sister, sweaty and teary._**

**_"I heard! I heard! Congratulations mama." and it sounded to Bobby like Liz was crying also. Then effusively she called from her place in a magical box on the table. "Bobby! Bobby I am so happy for you." and he felt her authenticity snake through him. And then he felt the truth, he was a father!_**

**_And after that it was funny the way the wide, wild world shrunk. And how it was suddenly just the three of them inside a paper bag. Everyone disappeared, the lights dimmed, everything was shot with a soft focus. A wee exhausted new life, drew new breath, nestled fully in the cleft of her mothers bare bosom. And a painfully large dad squished mostly (_****_except maybe for his size 13's and some of his left arm_**) under the covers of that twin bed with them... 

Imogen, the name, had come 24 hours later. And it had been Bobby's choice. Of course Alex loved the sound of it too but she probably never would have come up with it on her own. Bobby liked that it had weight and history, it had a story. It was a name created by William Shakespeare for a character in his play Cymbeline. Or rather (as lore had it) the name was a Shakespearean era typo, mistakenly printed in lieu of the - at the time - more popular Innogen. To Alex's American ear Imogen sounded sophisticated and sultry and a whole lot European. But Bobby had really won her over when he'd uttered the nickname Immy. Immy, Alex thought, sounded sweet and unique. And their little girl was that, both the former and the latter. Besides, a nickname was practically a prerequisite in the Goren household.

Immy was still trending a bit small, currently sitting in the 35 percentile according to the pediatricians growth chart. She was a striking and delicate child. She had dark hair with a definite tendency to kick up into a curl. She had huge clear eyes set in a pudgy edible heart shaped face. Alex searched high and low for a hint of herself in her little Bobby clone. But she figured she'd have to be satisfied with her genetic contributions of size and disposition, because all signs pointed toward small and scrappy.

"Baby girl, why are you so wide awake?" Alex murmured, "Were you hot? Oh poor thing. Were mommy and daddy making too much noise?" She lifted Immy tucking her small bare body against the warm exposed skin of a shoulder "Bad mommy and daddy, getting it on." It was the tone after all not the content right?

From the corner of the room the comfy rocker beckoned seductively. Alex knew the rules, they were written in black and white on the pages of all the sleep training books, "straight back to bed with no fanfare." But on a night like this, the soft lure of dimpled baby skin, no persistent inner voice telling her she had to work in the morning, it was too much to resist. She sat down in the chair and put her feet up and continued the clandestine dialogue.

"You are a beautiful little girl." Alex kissed a palm feeling small fingers curl and tug her lips. "Mommy loves you." a devoted stream of consciousness. "Tomorrow is a big day. We're going to the park." Immy squealed and smiled getting ever farther from sleep. **_Now who's turning this into playtime_** Alex thought guiltily. And she did the only thing she could to pacify, she peeled back her bra and fed her nipple into the waiting mouth. "Just a little something to eat." She whispered.

They were trying to slow wean Imogen, a process to be completed for her first birthday. And that decision source of waves of maternal guilt, guilt at arbitrarily weaning and now guilt at this additional (off schedule) feeding. It was a zero sum game this motherhood. Alex had to mentally justify the decision to wean during every feeding. There was no rush, it was just that Alex was stretched incredibly thin. Something had to give. With a 45 minute commute (each way), an average 12 hour workday, a busy home life and the intensive effort that went into pumping and freezing and planning it just wasn't sustainable.

But it was so hard to let it go, to drop even one feed. And it was just as hard for Imogen to part with the liquid love that came from her mothers breasts. The warm sweet nourishment with a side order of skin to skin contact. Immy often showed her juvenile displeasure by refusing everything but her the breast in the evenings. Her daughter craved it, she craved it. After a day away from her child Alex could hardly wait to settle back into their cosy chair, she could hardly wait to feel that little mouth tug away at her breast, she could hardly wait rediscover that elemental connection and to gaze endlessly into those chocolate brown eyes. They were Bobby's eyes.

"We'll steal our moments while we can." she murmured. "They won't last forever."


	6. Chapter 6

It was a beautiful summers day. This year seemed to be blessed with more then it's share of sublime days. It was sunny, bright and hot enough to reveal some skin, but not hot enough to roast it raw. On this 'family day' they had decided to make the short walk over to the park. Alex looked at her list: diapers, vaseline, sun screen, the world tiniest bathing suit (she smiled holding it up running a thumb over it's little daisy motif), towel, blanket and a stuffed cooler bag that would all fit perfectly beneath their Quinny stroller.

She looked over at Bobby and rolled her eyes. _**They'll get stuck that way**_ a small voice taunted but she couldn't help it. The world was an absurd place. Bobby had informed her, soon after they woke (with great pride of contribution) "You have the morning for yourself, you prep in peace, I'll keep this little trouble maker out of the way" he'd waggled the small girl back and forth until she drooled.

Well he'd done that, Alex supposed, his snores had kept her company through all her jobs. He was sprawled out on the couch, legs akimbo. And their girl (this actually _was_ _her_ nap time) lay, a perfect lump in the centre of his chest, dressed in her peach patterned jumper and matching headband. She had one pudgy little leg drawn up, two precious fingers in her mouth her lips involuntarily pulling at them.

Any annoyance was fleeting as Alex found a camera in her hand. She was a regular paparazza these days. **_She is the cutest thing ever created _** Alex observed in all her motherly bias _**and he isn't half bad either**_. Her sister had been so right, their child had filled a gap in both of them, but Immy had healed Bobby, truly and miraculously. He was a different man, so attentive and loving and protective. He was everything a father should be. They were only 9 months in of course, but Alex was boundlessly optimistic. They were so bonded. She really couldn't ask for more.

* * *

The trio left the apartment ready to battle the blazing ball in the noonday sky. Every square bodily inch slathered in sunscreen, shades and head gear. Bobby's old baseball cap (the one with the hand curved bill and well handled Yankees logo) was in place. They crossed busy Prospect Park West and arrived, the easiest commute. The hardest part was always trundling down the 3 storeys. But along with fellow residents, they were permitted to store one large item in a convenient closet on the ground floor. The room was crammed with bikes and strollers.

Alex pushed the stroller beside Bobby. He was holding Immy high against his chest, she looked like a doll in contrast, a third her father's length, surveying the vibrant world with wide baby eyes from under the floppy brim of a sun hat. Alex looked at her husband often because even two years on, sometimes she couldn't believe how far they'd come. And because on days like today when he was relaxed and dressed so casually (his red t-shirt taught across his chest tapering to his torso and outlined against a cerulean sky) she was struck by how beautiful he was.

Even with her busy schedule Alex had her fingers in every aspect of his well being. He'd fallen far from himself there for a while, widening and aging and she didn't want to lose him young, to heart disease or some preventable cancer. She made sure he ate well (he ate like a horse) but they were well rounded meals and she had threatened murder if she ever saw him with a cigarette (he had raised a finger to point out how redundant that threat was and she'd slapped it down). And Alex had even gotten him running, just a little. Not her ambitious marathons of miles and miles, but short morning sprints, 20 minutes behind the jogging stroller. All of it was paying off, he looked strong and healthy.

**_He guiltily came home one day from work a few weeks ago with a Walgreen's bag clenched in his hand behind his leather portfolio (old habits died hard). She almost hadn't seen it, he was so sly. But there had been something fishy in his demeanour, in the odd twist of his wrist. She hadn't been promoted up the ranks to Captain for nothing. Her eyes narrowed. Hinky. Very _****_hinky. _**

**_"Whatcha got there?"_**

**_"Nothin'" he muttered a bit evasively unloading his stuff onto the entry table._**

**_"Tell me." she probed suddenly very curious._**

**_"Don't you dare laugh at me." He'd warned her and she'd looked deep into his eyes and ran an index finger in an X over her heart. _**

**_"I w-was… I was at the food co-op on Thursday."_**

**_"Uh huh."_**

**_"And I was going through the checkout." he paused as if this were hard._**

**_"Uh huh."_**

**_"I was wearing Immy in that…" he snapped his fingers rapidly trying to recall._**

**_"Ergo?" _**

**_"Right, Ergo."_**

**_"And the cashier looked at us and said 'Your daughter is really cute.'" _****_  
_**

**_"Okay." she waited and nothing, she sensed he was done. "Sounds like a nice story." _**

**_"No, no, no. You aren't listening. He said 'Your daughter is really cute.' There was a half second pause between the words 'your' and 'daughter' and then a slight rise in inflection on the word 'daughter.'_**

**_"You're saying…"_**

**_"Yes." he _****_nodded emphatically, "He thought I was her grandfather!"_**

**_"Don't jump to conclusions, maybe a cool uncle." She smiled and this time he rolled his eyes. _**

**_"Remember you promised not to laugh." _****_He uncrumpled the bag and pulled out a box of hair dye._**

**_"No way!" she'd crowed but manage to keep her promise (barely)._**

**_"You promised." his face heated._**

**_"I'm not laughing." she hid the smile by grabbing the box and examining it. "Why do you have this anyway?" she tried to sound casual. "Your hair looks great."_**

**_"I am not a vain man." he stressed._**

**_"Not totally, no." She teased, he was a little vain. He liked a fully stocked, colour coordinated wardrobe (and boy did he baby it). She remembered the first time she'd seen his dresser drawer insert housing all those ties and then watched him lovingly roll and place each one in it's own little compartment. But he was right, he wasn't obsessive about it, just conscious._**

**_"I'm not ready to be a grandfather."_**

**_"So you want to dye your hair?"_**

**_"I don't want a drastic change." he insisted "I just want a little more pepper than salt." _**

**_Alex looked at his head with a critical eye. "Come 'ere" and she did a full inspection looking this way and that, cupping his ears._**

**_"Ticks, lice?" he joked at her thoroughness._**

**_"Very funny." _****_His hair was basically a spectrum of ashy lights and darks, with very little thinning. Alex thought he made aging sexy, but she understood where he was coming from. S_****_omething about children made you reassess, made you aware of the fragility of life and mortality, made you really consider all the changes facing you in the mirror._**

**_She couldn't _****_risk having him end up with a bad home dye job so she'd gently confiscated the Grecian Formula and booked him at her salon._**

Her stylist had done an awesome job. He looked mature, he looked exactly his age, maybe more 48 then 52. He looked hot. There was danger in all this staring. In all this physical obsession. She bit her lip. She wanted him. She wanted to use her tactical leg sweep to bring him down, right in the middle of this park, straddle him, pin him to the grass and ride him like a steed. Maybe it was because she'd repressed this so long, now it threatened to swamp her, the fact that she could finally_ have _what she'd been denied for over a decade. And he looked at her the very moment that naughty thought crossed her mind because even now his sixth sense hadn't eroded one iota, if anything it was stronger.

"I'd let you." he said simply.

"Stop reading my mind." She looked away, she'd been Goren'ed' and it felt so good.

* * *

Prospect Park was more then a park really it was a summertime bonanza. And throngs of fellow New Yorkers reflected that. There were playgrounds and a splash zone, duck ponds and lakes and running trails, a zoo and bandshell for warm weather musical performances. Today the plan was a casual stroll and maybe to get a little wet under the bronze water-breathing dragon. And they'd brought a blanket for the show stopper, a jazz concert for kids. Bobby, an unrepentant jazz lover wanted to cradle his baby girl and watch the free Wynton Marsalis concert. As he put it "Plant the seeds of greatness." He was sure Imogen was going to be a star.

"Let's set up here." Alex suggested in a spot out of the fray. The day was getting old now and they were all a little damp and tired from splashing. Alex shook loose the folds of an enormous blue and white blanket. And they kicked their sandals off into the warm thick grass and unloaded their gear. She cracked open 2 waters and handed one to Bobby. Families poured in around them similarly kitted out with picnic baskets and blankets and lawn chairs. They relaxed on their cotton island oasis for three and watched the world go by.

Immy was let loose and in short order had put a hank of grass into her mouth. "Oh yucky. So yucky." Alex swiped and wiped at her daughters mouth pouring a water over her little face to clear the mess. And the tot instantly forgot in favour of grabbing at the water bottle and jamming it into her little mouth mimicking drinking and nearly getting a lapful in the process. Immy was hitting the milestones: sitting, crawling, scooting, pulling up and babbling endlessly but they were still anxiously waiting for the a free stand and her first steps. Bobby reached down using a big paw to catch the small girl each time she hit the edge of the blanket destined for parts unknown.

"You stay here, munchkin." he laughed practicing the age old parenting art of re-direct, over and over and over.

"Are you hungry?" Alex asked him squinting then pulled her sunglasses down savouring the relief of cool eyes.

He perked up. "You have food in there?"

"Of course." Her smile said it all. Alex knew her husband needed to be fed steady and often. She was the proud mother of two babies. She'd made thick meat sandwiches, coleslaw, packed fruit, vege chips, trail mix, clearly this was not her first rodeo.

"Where did all this come from?" he marvelled in that endearingly clueless way men effect, as she pulled out tupperware after tupperware, ziplock after ziplock.

"A fairy made it while you were napping." she snarked. She was still the giver and he was still the taker but they were at peace with their roles, for the most part.

They ate. All the while Alex feeling the intense gaze of little eyes as she chewed, then the creeping, then a very graceless gripping and flopping over her bare legs and then she was lovingly mauled by her daughter's soft gooey mouth, set over hers, trying to get at the food she knew was inside.

"Are you hungry baby?" Alex laughed savouring the wet boundaryless love of her child and rewarding her initiative with ripe dripping pieces of watermelon, quartered grapes, sliced banana then some small soft bits of sandwich. "I'm going to nurse." she told Bobby off hand.

"Well tuck in." he gestured and planted his fists in the grass behind him, volunteering support so she could relax into the task.

"Thanks." she murmured edging over, her head finding his sturdy shoulder, the curve of her back tight to his ribs she gave him all of it, all of their weight, the trust implicit while lowering the flaps of her nursing bra and tank top. After months they finally had this thing down. At first breastfeeding had been new and a bit awkward and in public Alex had fought the feeling of being so exposed. But Bobby had been the reason she'd worked through it all, stuck with it, he was a cheerleader, and the biggest (unlikeliest) advocate of attachment parenting.

Listening to him spout off for all those years about everything under the sun still had not prepared Alex to meet Robert Goren father extraordinaire, walking the earth with a William Sears tome under his arm, espousing the benefits of bonding and babywearing and breastfeeding. It was the dawning of a new man. And Alex got to watch all the angst and worry and self-recrimination she knew had consumed her partner for years, transform into the ultimate care and consideration. Alex often felt the sting of tears watching Bobby (she was becoming such a soft touch) because it was clear he'd been waiting for this all his life. Being a father was his opus.

She was drawn from her thoughts and switched Immy to the other breast. And mid re-latch she suddenly had the strangest sensation she was being watched. The unwelcome tickle of eyes passing over her skin. She panned the swelling crowds, **_Of course someone is staring_**, afterall they were sitting amongst hundreds. But no one nearby seemed particularly interested in them. Alex felt a little shiver so incompatible with this sunshine that she tensed looking around again.

"What is it?" Bobby said his voice supple and soft above her ear.

"Nothing." she dismissed her own concerns, "I guess I'm still a prude." she glanced down at the suckling child.

"Think of the anti-bodies."

"Really? That's your pep talk?" Alex laughed.

"You have a monthly mortgage payment in those mammaries. Think of what we're saving on formula."

She elbowed him in the stomach and he grunted.

"Look at how happy she is, the trust in those little eyes."

"That's better."

And just then Immy struggled upright, refreshed and milky with a thunderous belch. And then the concert started and all was forgotten in favour of some listening and some baby grooving. Supported by daddy's hands the little girl danced, pushing up and down in pudgy little squats. It was perfect. Every second of it.

"She's going to be an artistic genius." Bobby grinned and held the beautiful tiny girl cheek to cheek and Alex commemorated the moment with a few rapid snaps of her camera.

* * *

They walked home slowly as the sun went down, their little one had given up the battle a half an hour earlier and was now sprawled out arms above her head, her carefree limbs filling her rolling bassinet. It had been a wonderful day, perhaps more so because all this fun was on their doorstep.

Everytime they walked through this park as a family Goren was hyper-aware that it was a wish fulfilled. He'd dreamt of this. Of course he hadn't realized it would be Prospect and not Central, but no matter, one Olmstead and Vaux was as good as another. He'd seen this very moment in his minds eye 17 months ago. Alex had been barely pregnant and so conflicted. She hadn't trusted him. She had been right, he admitted now, he'd been an asshole. But even then he had wanted a family _so badly_.

He'd had a premonition. Alex, as beautiful as she was now, tanned golden legs in cut off jean shorts. In his fantasy he'd been pushing a stroller and he'd wrapped an arm around her and tucked the tips of his fingers into her back pocket. And in response she'd leaned into him. And the three of them had meandered slowly down a nondescript path. He indulged himself and recreated that fantasy right now. And Alex unknowingly folded perfectly into that dream, clinging to him as he hoped, rubbing her hand against his chest looking up and smiling.

His heart swelled because he felt so fucking lucky.

Just absolutely blessed.

And then she faltered, she lost step she pulled back and looked behind them.

"What? What is it?" he glanced around as well.

She smiled but it didn't reach her eyes. "My spidey senses are tingling." But there was nothing off, families heading home and groups moving toward the subway. She swept her hair back out of her eyes and darted another quick look over her shoulder.

"Something's really bugging you."

"No." she frowned and shook off the vague sensation. "Must be cop paranoia."

"I'm getting soft is that what you're saying?" He was a civilian now. "A little dull around the instincts?" he quipped.

She ran her hand over him, taking every liberty she could out here in public, over his chest and stomach feeling his unyielding masculinity. "I wouldn't use the words soft or dull to describe you Mr. Goren." her voice was low and loaded.

"Mrs. Goren." Bobby whispered squeezing her just a little pressing his nose and lips into her ear, tangling and mussing her hair. "Beautiful. You're beautiful." he murmured for only her, quickening their pace just a little, propelling her along so that he could have her that much sooner.


	7. Chapter 7

They rode the subway together every morning all three of them. They got on the F train, then switched to the A train and then like clockwork exchanged quick kisses and quiet 'I love you's' before Bobby hopped off, headed to the PATH rail system, bound for Newark. Alex pushing her daughter in a feather light stroller, watched him wave and then get swallowed by the crowds. She sunk onto the beige utilitarian subway seat. She imagined him on the solitary leg of his journey, his nose buried in a book or with earbuds in place listening to his notes.

_**Lucky devil. **_She had Immy.

"It's just you and me kid." she quipped most mornings.

Childcare. That had been the question. The single most important decision either of them had ever made.

Near home or near work?

His work or hers?

Chain provider or small independent one?

And then the waiting lists. Oh, the New York waiting list. What stories they could tell. What stories they had lived! Marla Reynolds and her crazed waiting list executions, well now they had a hint of her desperation.

They'd bandied about ideas, investigated dozens of places and fretted endlessly as Alex's leave had drawn to an end. A parent's heart was a very deep and conflicted place. And then one day the solution had come to them in Tamara. A heaven-sent home care provider. Alex had _just clicked_ with the woman (and then run a comprehensive background on her and all the auxiliary staff). She was perfection. The centre was a small start up only 4 babies (for now). It was spotless, there was a curriculum (yes even for 9 to 12 month olds) and it was close enough to the 34th for her to drop in during lunch.

That was why they rode this train together every morning.

That was why Alex sacrificed, would sacrifice anything.

Imogen.

It was all for Immy.

* * *

On his train Bobby sat in wider more cushioned seats and, like every morning, lost himself in a meditative trance rocking gently with the rhythmic sway of the cabin keeping time with the clack of the rails. He thought about his family for the first little while. It had been hard, not going to work with Alex everyday. It'd been disorienting and depressing to say goodbye. That first day he had called her train from his train just to quell his nerves, just to hear her musical laughter because they'd only parted 10 minutes prior. Now alone he smiled at that memory.

But it was working now. They had eased into their new ritual. It wasn't painful anymore probably because they spent most every moment together after hours. Probably because he could touch her and hold her and she touched him and held him back, probably because they were bonded from the inside out.

_**We're still unnaturally close**_.

He flexed his hands actually feeling a bit bereft, thinking of her but unable to touch her.

Alex.

Even on this train bound out of state, their daily commutes were comparable. He appreciated her sacrifice, commuting with a baby while he had half an hour of relative quiet to get his head straight everyday, to get lost in his inner world. His mind went on an impressive journey. He had a small experiment planned today. Determining how people process stimuli in their environment - information processing science it was called - he wanted the class to engage in a social perception exercise. Then just as easily his mind wandered to the fridge **_no oatmeal this morning, not enough milk,_** **_pick some up on the way home_**. Then he looked down at his navy trousers. _**When was the last time these were at the dry cleaners?**_ He thought absently.

His eyes moved casually, dispassionately over the interior of the train. His view was a sea of seat backs and cuffs and leather shoes that spilled into the aisle, along with the multi-tonal tops of strangers heads.

On their slow journey is eyes alighted on something familiar. They stopped and held onto the back of one woman's head in particular. He craned his neck a little. From this awkward angle he caught a hint of neck and shoulder - lean and narrow - and gleaming golden hair.

She was 8 rows up and talking to a seat mate. And just something about her.

He couldn't tear himself away.

He stared hard at the back of her head. _**What is it about this woman?**_ He felt so… drawn. He frowned. He heard the light lilting tone but couldn't decipher her words from this distance. Then she turned ever so slightly no more then a few degrees and he saw her profile.

That profile.

A shocking silhouette. It took him a moment to regain himself.

Nicole?

"Nicole" the word left his mouth before he could stop it. He said it again more to himself "Nicole." A ghost. He was losing it, he was flipping out on a commuter train between Manhattan and Newark. He dropped his head gripping squeezing and mashing the flesh between his fingers as if trying to physically rearrange his thoughts.

It worked.

He looked up again and the seat was empty. He looked everywhere. Left, right, back, front, craning and leaning. Even up and down, as though she might be lying on the floor under her seat or suddenly gained the ability to suction to the ceiling.

_**What the hell?**_

_**What the fucking hell?!**_

People around him edged away a little taken aback by his sudden obvious irritation. And dammit he was irritated. Turned inside out. He popped up out of his seat. Ran-walked up the aisle gripping vinyl headrests shakily. Until he got to where the ghost had been. Nothing. Empty.

"There was a woman here." He barked harshly at a middle aged, middle management looking lady in the seat adjacent.

She startled.

"Was there?!" he pled loudly.

"Yes, yes, she just went to the washroom." he looked closely at the seat something glinted nestled in the groove of the seam. It was hollow and cylindrical. He rolled it between his fingers. Like a charm. Like a talisman - like a Buddha keyring. Inside he pulled out a small scroll and recognized familiar script. A Thai good luck mantra. He lost his footing but managed not to go down.

He slipped it into his pocket regaining himself throwing his head in all directions, wildly, erratically. Moving quickly down the train car, then through the doors into the next and the next and the next, peering into the eyes of every passenger along the way. But to no avail. He even waited at the washroom door until a old, bent gentleman with a cane exited. Nowhere. She was nowhere. Vapour. He'd dreamt it.

He felt his pulse slow. He ran his hands over his hair a few times.

But then in his pocket his fingers glanced the little talisman. _This_ definitely hadn't been a dream. He slowly made his way back to where he'd seen her.

"Do you know the woman that was sitting here?" he asked the same seat mate, trying this time to be a bit more normal, a bit more measured, a bit more casual. He forced his hands down and a lightness into his tone.

"No, no. I just met her." The woman's hands closed around the handle of her bag anxiously. Despite his better efforts he was still intimidating.

"What did she say? If you don't mind my asking."

"She was telling me her love story." The woman smiled just a little as if recalling something fondly, "She married her soul mate they worked together for a dozen years, they have a baby, 9 months old. It was so sweet, she was glowing."

"Anything else," He bit out, he was going to be ill. "Did she have an accent?"

"No." the woman shook her head " Nothing I caught."

"Her name?"

"Alex. She said her name was Alex."


	8. Chapter 8

"Bit early to get started on that isn't it." Alex joked. And he just grunted and knocked back a whisky neat. Bobby was at home sitting in his Eames chair staring at his daughter and wondering if his world was about to go to shit.

Either he was insane or that stone cold crazy bitch was back. He wasn't keen on either option. Something in him had known, just known all these years that Nicole wasn't dead. But he had stopped saying it, because he couldn't bear everyone's judgmental glares. Everyone thinking - _**I know what they were thinking**_ - that he needed Nicole. That he had lost all grip on reality. That he prefered a living lunatic (and a racing pulse and a puzzle) to a dead lunatic and a safer world.

But they were wrong.

Maybe when he'd first met 'Elizabeth Hitchens' at Hudson all those years ago. Witty and pretty and with a curious mind. Maybe he'd been intrigued by her. But that was before he'd known what she was and witnessed the scope of her malignancy. Now the thought of her turned his stomach.

Besides he had nothing to offer Nicole, not their old twisted intimacy or their barely veiled foreplay. _He didn't want that_. He really didn't. Nicole had made his blood run hot once upon a time. But now, what he had here, Alex, his beautiful Alex, she made it run hotter.

And something horrific occurred to him in that living room chair, something that made his heart thump and icy fear pump through his veins. He had nothing to fight Nicole with. He didn't have a badge, he didn't have a mandate, he had no jurisdiction. He was weak and unlike all the other times when he'd gotten right up into her face and taunted the beast, now he had something to live for. He had once looked at Nicole and smelled blood in the water. Well right now he was hemorrhaging. Everywhere.

_**Fuck you Declan!**_

He slammed back another large mouthful and savoured the hot dangerous path it took to his stomach. His useless decrepit mentor. With the passage of time and with some perspective Bobby had begun to soften on the old man. Especially now that Declan was a shell of himself, forgetting so much of what had made him brilliant, stumbling around like a toddler. **_Especially now that Jo was gone._** She had succeeded one cold winter morning 3 years ago in ending her life. She'd used a bedsheet wrapped (for tension) around the bathroom door and a short drop off the toilet seat. Bobby had gone to see her corpse that day. He'd looked at her wasted, grey face, actually brushed a knuckle to her sagging cheek and the impression lingered. And it occurred to him that he would be imprinted on her until she decayed. That day he'd shrugged off tears. Tears of both relief and sadness. It was the oddest thing.

_**"Did you ever ask yourself why? Why nobody ever came through for you? You think it was your fault?**_

_**"Yes I've thought that."**_

_**"It isn't you know. They failed you. You did everything you could for them and more."**_

_**"Thanks."**_

_**"Just like I did for Jo."**_

That was exactly the moment he knew the delusion had swallowed the man. For years Bobby had managed to ignore the dark and troubled facets of his mentor. But now… Now Bobby brought dull, worried eyes to Immy. Looking long into her bright keen ones, that were just peeking over the edge of the playpen. And he couldn't imagine that kind of rejection, that level of alienation from one's own child.

He remembered Jo, a young gangly Jo, hovering in doorways, watching them like a ghost while he and Dec had hashed out horrific gut-churning facts about one murder or another. Piles, stacks of gore pinned to the wall, taped to the fridge, facsimiles of mutilation always around for her to peruse whenever she pleased. Back then Bobby had ignored Declan's blind devotion to serial killers. He'd watched oblivious as Declan cultivated the moist fertile ground for dysfunction in his only daughter. Because back then Bobby's revulsion at Declan's parenting had been intellectual, but now gazing at his own daughter it was monstrous.

But his relationship with Declan was deep and complicated. Layered - all crust and mantle and core, it shifted in tectonic chunks, then moved subtly, glacially. And it housed all kinds of little living things wriggling and squirming in the dark. It was so much more then that one dark moment between Alex and Jo. It was so much more then Declan's alliance with Nicole, and his brothers subsequent murder.

Bobby had been a young man in the army when they'd met, living two lives. He'd been regimented and tidy but then during his authorized leaves totally _unleashed_, taking every opportunity to spread his seed and good cheer across Europe. He hadn't thought one second about home and family in those days.

Then Declan had come along and suddenly, _purpose_. Declan had been soft toward him. Declan had been the first man that had ever treated him well. Declan had told a lost young soldier that he was a genius, and Bobby, ever hip to platitudes and liars had immediately known that he was genuine. And since nothing quite buoyed a broken spirit like support, encouragement and recognition Bobby had flourished under his tutelage. Declan had given him that. How could he ever repay that gift? He couldn't. Declan had saved him and Bobby would always feel he owed him something for that.

But he would never forgive him for this.

He would never forgive Declan for leaving him open to this… this… demon again. For allowing him to believe he was safe and that it was over and that he could move on.

_**"You're free now. Bobby you're free."**_

He wanted to scoop up his precious baby and to grab Alex and run. He wanted to give in to his cowardice and his old lone wolf tendencies and never look back. But he couldn't. He just couldn't. His heart was etched, love had written there on it and he would forever belong to Alex to Immy. His family.

_**But you aren't alone.**_ Something smarter then him whispered. _**You have a secret weapon.**_ Because Alex wasn't weak and Alex did have a badge and she was a damn good cop. In fact now she was powerful, she could requisition an army with the stroke of her pen. He just needed to _tell_ her. But something kept him silent. Maybe it was fear that he was worrying about phantoms. Maybe it was fear that this was late (late, late) onset schizophrenia.

He refilled his glass.

Alex watched her husband from the kitchen. She didn't like this at all. She worried the inside of her lip, watching him take sip after sip of the amber liquid. He was slouching, low in the chair almost lying down, his legs splayed the glass resting on his stomach. Immy in her bright pink sleeper was up at the edge of her playpen gumming it, staring at him. Almost begging him to play or pick her up, but he didn't even notice. Alex shook her head and summoned a little courage because she knew he might very well lash out, he might bite if she intruded. But she had to.

She moved between his thighs, and took the glass. His hand tightened around it a second too late, closing in on itself.

"Reduced reaction time." She tsked. And he looked up at her. He looked incredibly sad.

She set the glass down out of his reach and said "Tell me about it."

"It's nothing."

"Getting loaded at 7pm?"

"Just feel like taking the edge off a little." he rumbled.

"No." _**They weren't going back here,** _she thought fiercely, **_they weren't going back to sloppy self-loathing drunkenness_**.

"You're my mother now?" he said a bit meanly and she sighed rubbing her forehead. And then just like that he snatched at her and she lost her footing and fell onto him. He pressed cool wet lips to hers and he tasted like Glenlivet and desperation.

"Bob…" he smothered the word with his mouth keeping her on her back and then his hand went straight between her thighs, pressing. Because he _wanted_. And sometimes when he was bad and moody he just reached out and _took_. Sex was easy. With sex there was no talk or imposed social mores. But Alex was blindsided and she wrenched her mouth away.

"The baby…" she exclaimed.

"She doesn't care."

"I do!" she grabbed his hand grinding his knuckles together painfully. The pain was sobering.

"Oh God. I'm sorry." he came to his senses just like that blinking rapidly. He didn't own her. She wasn't here to gratify or to distract him. And he didn't want his daughter to see what a neanderthal asshole he could be. He slid up quickly in the chair, straightening out both in mind and body. "Fuck." he gave his head a shake. Alex wriggled to get away.

But he clung to her wrist. "I'm sorry." he said again tilting his head low to catch her eyes. "Let me hold you."

She'd been about to cold cock him and just like that he was her Bobby again, cradling her, looking at her with his particular brand of tortured regret. She turned into him and he wrapped those guns around her, drowning her in dense warmth. She kissed his neck, breathing deeply because there was only one other thing on this planet that she loved as much as him. A squealing, burbling, gurgling tiny someone who was watching their every move with complete fascination.

"You want to tell me?" Alex asked eventually, her voice barely there. She wasn't used to being on the outside of his professional problems. She assumed this was about work.

"Maybe later." he tightened his grip closing his eyes.

"Okay baby." she let him know with softness of voice and a hint of submission that she was his, his for comfort, his for love, his for devotion, his forever. Eventually he would trust her with this.

He kissed her softly then, hanging on to her - his sanity - he whispered "I love you. You'll never know…"


	9. Chapter 9

And when the days passed, full to be sure, but uneventful he started to think _**yeah,**_ **_it was a hysterical illness._** An emotional manifestation of stress. But the talisman hadn't vanished, he looked at it every morning nestled between his work socks. And he became kind of happy to see it. If it vanished too then what would that say about his mental health? If he were actually touching and holding his delusions that would be so much more disturbing.

But then the inappropriate habits began.

He'd pick it up and roll it between his fingers, then across his knuckles. Then slowly he began to bring it to work. Then one day (while he was sipping his black Columbian roast inside the Atrium Cafe of the Newark office) he pulled it out, opened it up and unrolled the little piece of paper. By the end of the week he was meditating on it, repeating the phrase on the tiny scroll to himself over and over.

It became a symbol. Symbolic of his obsessive compulsive behaviours, behaviours he had managed to harness, using his powers for good, using them to fixate on his family and his work. It became symbolic of his tendency to go it alone. It became symbolic of his worst fears. This... this thing... this little glass cylinder with it's innocuous chant had cast a spell on him. It's darkness (or the darkness of it's original owner) had grabbed hold of him. And slowly it was turning back the clock. He wasn't fully present in his life anymore. He and Alex now seemed to constantly be having the same conversation:

"Bobby!" Alex barked exasperated, "Bobby have you heard a word I've said?"

"Uh no… What was that?"

* * *

Currently it was Monday and Bobby was at work, inside the FBI satellite office at 11 Centre Place, Claremont Tower. He was at the lectern looking out over his pupils. There was an ambient glow on the audience making them a soft and indistinct mass, but Bobby stood illuminated on a dias with layers of sharp and nuanced light coating him from every angle. In the background a large white screen displayed everything he wrote on his tablet in real time, a series of sharp, clear, black strokes.

Here at the Newark field office Bobby had two functions. He was an instructor with the National Academy program. In this role he offered his expertise to law enforcement and executives alike. It was large multi-disciplinary, multi-pronged class. The auditorium sat 300 and he was part of a team of experts that offered a comprehensive educational program - by invitation only. They also designed the curriculum for the Virtual Academy the online equivalent for distance learners. Newark office was ideally equipped for this task with a state of the art facilities, in the most densely populated region of the country and on the doorstep of the largest municipal police force.

His second function was teaching future special agents in training. It was a position traditionally based at the FBI academy out of Quantico, West Virginia but time and technology were ushering in new procedure. He was one the first trainers to run an interactive video classroom. Students over there, watched his image from here, as he was beamed onto a screen hundreds of miles away, they could ask questions and engage him normally. His class was mandatory 20 hours per recruit, equal to roughly an hour per week of basic training.

Bobby imagined that all this was as close to a rock star as he'd ever be. It was extraordinarily gratifying to have his body of work dissected and sopped up by these sponges. Because now he realized he had reached the pinnacle. He had achieved something tangible. He had a breadth and depth of knowledge that was in demand. Now _he_ was the mentor.

He took his tablet in hand and wrote in bold block font: **Diathesis-Stress Model**

"The question is how do we both measure and predict antisocial behaviour? The answer is the The Diathesis-Stress model. It is a psychological theory that accounts for a large arc in individual outcomes by measuring behaviour against both biological - nature, and environmental - nurture, factors." He projected his voice to the back of the room. "For example: A little girl is born with, we'll say a family history of depression. That is the biological factor. Then we compound that 'vulnerability,' with her environment, let's say, an abusive parent. This is a marker for future antisocial behaviour."

A hand shot up at the back of the room. **_Questions?_** Bobby was a bit surprised. He still hadn't fully deconstructed the topic matter.

"What about twins?" a disembodied voice asked.

He couldn't quite see the speaker, her body was perfectly obscured by the man in front of her. But something about the quality of her voice had him pausing and squinting.

"Fraternal? Identical? Same living conditions?" he probed shaking off his reaction and trying to set some parameters on the question.

"Monozygotic. Two children raised in identical circumstances. But with a completely different social outcome."

_**Mono… monozy… what?… Oh identical.** _His mind was working fast, trying to keep up and not be made a fool of, maybe this was a biologist or a doctor.

"There have been studies using this model done on twins.." He looked up and to the left. "If you see me after class I can give you some reference texts, but off the top of my head, uh, Holland, Fairburn… all talk about the incidence of shared social disorders in monozygotic twins."

"Thank you. But I would like to know your opinion." she probed. Bobby felt a little flutter in his stomach, going off script was always less then ideal.

"Well, any specific case would require in depth study and comparison. But if you'll allow me to make some assumptions..." he considered it, he took a sip of water (that old dry throat). "If there were an equivalent biological diathesis in each twin, we would hypothesize different outcomes if one twin had a a greater exposure to _unique_ adversity. That is, if there were a stressor somehow experienced by one twin but not the other. Another perfectly acceptable hypothesis, would be discordant birth. That is, twins with complications arising during the birthing process, sometimes have had different outcomes. But again, without a case file this is all complete conjecture."

"But you do believe it's possible" she pushed, "to put it simplistically, have a good twin and a bad twin."

"Anything is possible I suppose." he conceded the point and then deepened his voice for authenticity, "In the realm of human psychology anyway. The mind is vast and greatly uncharted" he chuckled a little. Feeling uncomfortable. A little discombobulated by her aggressive pursuit and he would have covered nicely but then she moved the out into view, tilting her head slightly allowing the down lights to catch medium length golden hair and pouting lips.

He almost lost it. In front of 236 professionals.

It was Nicole.

It really was and she wasn't vapourizing, no puff of smoke, no magically empty seat.

He cleared his throat.

He let a hand rest on the lectern for support.

He felt mild vertigo.

And he actually whispered, "Nicole." Unfortunately there was no whispering when you were mic'd to the hilt. His 'whisper' rippled through the air then shook 472 eardrums.

There was dulcet laughter then."No, it's Melissa. Melissa Baird."

"Right." he looked around in general apology, giving his head a small shake. "Sorry. Back on point now..."


	10. Chapter 10

He tore out of the auditorium looking for her the second the class dismissed. Trying not to give his relatively new employer the impression that they'd hired a lunatic. Not that firing him would be a linear process, this was after all the federal government, his actually employer were the layers of bureaucracy. But still, **_a little decorum Goren_**.

If he thought he would have to look far, he was mistaken. She was there in all her psychopathic glory, sipping something from a white paper cup, legs elegantly crossed, her posture pitch perfect. He moved and stood in front of her and looked down.

"Here you are looking not quite so dead."

Her brow creased. "I think you're mistaken."

"You have got to be kidding me."

"Humor is not my intention." she looked down demurely and took a sip.

"This is the FBI aren't you worried?" he was stunned at the woman's gall. "I could have you arrested in a second." he threatened low and menacingly, stretching the truth for dramatic effect. He doubted he could do anything in a second. This woman didn't even exist. The New York Medical Examiner's office had signed her death certificate, for now she hovered comfortably beyond the reach of anyone.

"You are making me very uncomfortable." she said and it was the first time he noticed a distinctly American ring to her speech.

"Cut the crap Nicole. How much did that perfect elocution cost you? Or did you learn it in some domestic prison?"

"My name is Melissa Baird." she stated evenly.

"Hitchens, Haynes, Eastman, Baird, Wallace… whatever. It's a miracle you even know what planet you're on the way you change names." He snapped.

"I'm finding you very threatening right now." The woman looked at him icily. "I am not this Nicole. And I would hate to have to make a scene."

Her composure, her genuine ring and her firm rebuff made him pause a moment. But he'd been through a little too much with this particular woman to be deterred.

"Show me some identification." He demanded, which he knew was no proof at all for the likes of her. She could manufacture a new identity without breaking a sweat, but he was stalling for time, trying to decide what to do. "It's a little too coincidental, you here in my class wearing the face of a woman that tried to ruin my life."

She jumped bit at that. Then dug into her purse in genuine agitation and pulled out her wallet with shaky hands, handing it to him showing him reams and reams of information all bearing the name Melissa Baird. Credit cards, drivers licence, ticket stubs, bank cards… and the kicker: a family. A gleaming grinning testament to her truth, a slightly wilted, shiny photo that looked like it'd been handled often. And there were young children, but not so young that they could have been procured (because satan didn't bear children she procured them) in the elapsed 5 years. One of the children pressed against her in the image was probably 8 or 9.

"There. That's my life." she said. "Those are my children. My husband Garrett. I work for the county clerk's office."

He was gutted. _This woman_, working in the office of an officer of the court? What was going on? How could they give her access to such sensitive information? How could they not have done a comprehensive background check? And then it hit him. Twins. She'd been inquiring about twins. She was trying to tell him that she had one. She was taunting him with the knowledge that she had found a way to game the system. And suddenly the scope of her power was a blackness unfurling before his eyes, a terror inducing spread. The office of the county clerk controlled documentation, of all sorts related to supreme court cases, but also to issues of marriage, passports, identity, they authenticated birth documents. In short she had everything she needed execute an identity swap and well… well who knew if she'd stop there.

"How did you manage that." he said from between tight lips.

"Manage? I've worked there for the last 12 years."

"Well I'm certain your boss won't mind explaining it to me." he stared her down.

"You leave me alone. I don't know you." She cried just loud enough to turn a few heads. His stomach clenched and now she was making a scene in his workplace. Bravo Nicole.

His hands balled up into fists. He jammed them into his pockets to keep from striking her. He wanted to grab her throat and sink his fingers deep into the flesh. He wanted to close her windpipe. He wanted to slam her head into the floor. And watch as her hair matted with blood and those soulless brown eyes glazed over. He wanted to step casually through the pool of crimson as it spread around her and leave his footprint on her grave.

Sadistic pleasure coursed through him at the thought and in an instant he was back there with his hands around Brady's throat, cold cinder block scrapping his knuckles, the old degenerate egging him on:

_**"Go ahead. Kill me. You can do it. They'll let you do it. They don't care. You have it in you. You have it in you..."**_

He scared himself.

He could have done it, then and now.

He wondered if he still might have to.

But he pushed aside everything but this moment. His senses keen, the world bright, his palms clammy, his pupils dilated and his heart racing. He was fighting for his life. For everything he'd made. He was fighting for his child. As far as he was concerned it was no holds barred. He got nice and low and close. So close he could smell the coffee lingering on her tongue. And he whispered "You vicious bitch. You better disappear or you're going to wish you'd stayed dead, when I get through with you. If you come near me again _I will kill you_."

She gasped, looking shaky and weepy and making a mockery of the truly innocent she said, "I don't understand what I could have possibly done to you."

"You murdered my brother."


	11. Chapter 11

**A/N: I love the reviews so far. Especially the long commentaries and all the speculation. It's really inspiring to see where people imagine the story will go and set that against where I intend to take it. This time around I'm really enjoying creating a backstory, researching NYC boroughs, real estate, historical properties, Prospect Park, subway systems, reading newspaper articles and speculating about life in the real world how these characters might move through it. ****I was in Washington DC a few weeks ago and listened to some real police officers talking about the perils of policing. VDO was there too, but I only saw him at a distance. But it all put me in the right frame of mind to write this little tale.**

**There were a couple of questions embedded in the reviews:**

**Imogen is pronounced _IM-eh-jen_. It's Celtic and a good deal more popular in the UK and I honestly don't know why I chose it. I have never met an Imogen. I guess to me it sounded a little up and coming (granny chic) and I thought the nickname was sweet. I also thought it reflected our leading man (always considering meaning) and our leading lady culturally.**

**Bobby and Alex are 52 and 46 respectively in this story. They may be on the old side of parenting, but not life, not yet! I think it's realistic to write them as still very career driven and very ****vibrant. **

* * *

"Bobby we have to go now." Alex called impatiently. He'd been dragging all morning and they had an hour long drive ahead to Connecticut. She wasn't naive. She knew that something was bothering him. Devouring him from the inside. But they had committed to this weeks ago, a barbecue in the park with the whole family to celebrate the 4th of July.

"I'm coming, I'm coming." he grumbled and on days like this she felt really _really_ married. The kind of married that was in the small print on the brochure.

_May cause annoyance, frustration and a good deal of irritation. If you develop suicidal thoughts or actions, anxiety, panic, aggression, anger, mania, abnormal sensations, hallucinations, paranoia, or confusion don't lose your shit and for God's sake don't engage, just call your doctor right away._

She wasn't overreacting. So much had preceded this seemingly innocent exchange. On her way home from work yesterday Alex had managed to detour to the supermarket to buy the burgers and drinks they'd promised to bring today, all that after a 10 hour shift and with a very cranky Imogen on her hip (on her hip and not in the stroller). No, after a day away from mommy, her daughter had been griping her blouse and gnawing on her collarbone and sulking loudly. Alex had steered that stroller through the market awkwardly, with one hand, grinding the wheels and almost tipping out the groceries inside. When she'd got home so frustrated and tired there hadn't been the succulent smell of dinner (or even a light on in the apartment) but Bobby had been a glass deep in Glenlivet again.

Alex had woken up early this morning (on her day off) and been appalled by all the clutter and dust bunnies. So she'd gotten busy tidying a work week's worth of neglect. Then she'd packed the food _she_ had gotten, into a cooler and dressed the baby. Then Alex had showered (by pulling her bouncing and gurgling dependant - complete with jumperoo into the bathroom - no mean feat as the contraption _did not_ want to fit through the door). And then she had slipped into her unmentionables and cobalt blue maxi sundress under the heat of those same curious little eyes. All of this while Bobby slowly roused and then tortured them both with a profanity laced search for his sandals.

Needless to say she was about to snap.

"I don't need this today." she heard him mumble and then she did snap.

"You have got to be kidding me! You have done absolutely nothing this morning. Or for the last week for that matter. Now you want me to dress you too? Come on Bobby!"

Her explosion stung because she was right. He had been mentally absent for the last ten days. His mind was in overdrive with issues of Nicole Wallace. Gratefully the shrew hadn't popped out from behind any planters or lampposts, she had left him alone for the last two days. Unfortunately he hadn't left her alone. He'd been chasing this up in his free time stalking this Melissa Baird. He had called her boss. He'd also called in a favour a 1PP and had a full background run on her. All the while ignoring the voice that whispered **_You didn't need that favour, your wife is a cop. _**

He'd stopped short of going to Nicole/Melissa's family home. But in his mind that was the next step.

_**Deja vu.**_

Only this time it'd be a 'not so detective' Goren trying to persuade another gullible stiff that he had hitched his wagon to a murdering psycho. "Inoculated against the truth." Gavin Haynes hadn't been very receptive, he expected Garrett Baird wouldn't be either. And now he had even less authority, because even with FBI credentials he wasn't an agent. The weight of the law would not be behind his words.

And during all this he'd been secretive and evasive with Alex. Bobby knew he was asking too much of her, with her job and with a demanding young child. She was already heroic. She was already a superwoman and he was turning her into Job.

"I'm sorry." he admitted culpability. "I don't know why I can't get it together." But not the truth.

They did eventually (inevitably) manage to get out the front door, even though it felt like some unseen force didn't want them to. They piled into the Honda Accord it was a recent upgrade, a new car after a series of used ones. Alex liked Honda's so they bought a Honda. They shared the car, even had a nice off street space, another perk of the apartment. And, as because of their huge commuter bill, had scaled insurance coverage _way_ back to occasional use. But Alex speculated that there might come a time when she would have to go back to driving. A time in the not so distant future when Immy would stop co-operating on their hour long journey each morning. A time when a flimsy stroller belt wouldn't contain her little ball of energy.

"You mind if I turn this on." he asked absently fiddling with the radio dial.

"Please do." her voice was tight, music (and not conversation) was just what she needed.

It was a pleasant drive to Connecticut after the angst of their parting moments, sunny and serene with their little one asleep in the back seat. The windows were down and the music was loud and Bobby drove. As it turned out the driving thing, her absolute inflexibility had been a bit of bravado on her part. In retrospect she admitted it had been her desire to control the outcomes and prove herself worthy. Now that she was done with the internal tug of war that had plagued her years in Major Case, she could relinquish the wheel to him quite easily. The dynamic now was 50/50, maybe even 70/30 in his favour.

Still, today in all her unhappiness she couldn't resist the odd passive aggressive comment. "Are you actually going to change lanes today?" or "Do you see that Buick?"

He just sighed and clenched his jaw.

* * *

Liz lived on the brink of a stunning piece of conservation land, just outside the boundary of a state park, Greenwich Point Park. It had sandy beaches that went on forever not to mention BBQ pits and picnic tables. And every 4th of July Liz's neighbourhood association put on an impressive light display, a fireworks show that Alex thought (from years past) was worthy of a fortune 500 corporation (or maybe demanded by her fortune 500 neighbours).

The display was set mostly to classical music and after a day of stuffed faces and laughter the final song, 'America the Beautiful', set to bursting red, white and blue was inspiring enough to bring a tear to the eye. All the 4th's of years past had been magical - togetherness set against the grandeur of cascading colour. But Alex would always remember one 4th of July in particular.

Was it 5? No definitely 6 years ago. **_Yeah 2007._** A year when they'd both been wrestling with some major demons. Bobby had been dating some bar bunny back then because even at his worse he had rarely been unattached. Alex had reluctantly watched the stream of women Bobby had dated over the years. He hadn't confided in her. That wasn't their way. No, she'd been a good detective, catching one-side of a private phone conversation, or watching him freshen up before leaving for the day, and she would just know. Some of those girlfriends had been real glutens for punishment. In 2007 Bobby had been horrible boyfriend material.

But July 4th, 2007 had been the first time that their platonic private life had collided with the obligations of his new romantic relationship. He'd begged off, told her he was trying to make it work with his new girlfriend. He'd told Alex he needed to go to _her_ family thing."Maybe next time." he'd said.

_**Kate. Ugh. Kate Saunders**_.

Tall, dark gorgeous (as was Bobby's type). And even that had stung Alex, his 'type', because it had been so far from her own short, ashy blond, straight up and straight down tomboy affect. Kate, who'd popped into the squad room one day popping out of her top - well endowed was the word. Alex still bit the inside of her cheek thinking about it. But the thing that made that 4th (all those years ago) memorable wasn't Kate, it was when Bobby had pulled up in his Mustang an hour before the fireworks display. He'd driven an hour from the city "Plans fell through." he said shortly and Alex had known that was all she was going to get.

"But what about Kate?" she'd pushed, confused. And he'd just shrugged and waved her off, as was his way back then. But they had watched the fireworks together, sitting a respectable 6 feet from each other on a plaid blanket in her sister's backyard. Their first 4th of July ever. It gave the holiday special resonance for Alex, even though there would be years of 4th's and Thanksgivings and Christmases until they would finally find each other.

Alex had eventually asked Bobby (years later) when she felt like she had a right, and when she knew he would answer. "What happened? Why did you show up that day? Did you and Kate have a fight?"

"No." he'd said "I just realized where I wanted to be, with family."

That day had a special corner in her sentimental heart.

The day he'd put her first.

* * *

"Finally!" Liz's groany exclamation hit them through the open car window as they pulled in. They watched her walk-bound toward them. At 40 she was still a kid, still fun and chronically impatient. "I thought you'd never get here and I'd never get my hands on this sweet little girl." her voice went gooey.

"Oh. So you just want me for my baby." Alex snarked.

"Maybe" Liz grinned unbuckling her niece from the car seat and pulling her tight and close breathing her in deep and kissing her pudgy baby cheeks. Liz looked like a chocophile biting into a bar after a long diet, she closed her hazel eyes with pleasure. Bobby and Alex watched amused. And Liz fired "I have a ten year old don't fault me for needing this." And to her credit Immy took all of the touching and cuddling in stride.

Greenwich Point Park was a 'summer in Connecticut' postcard, green and warm,it was a bit breezy but it let the trees loosen up and shake out their hair. Everyone was already there, command central had been set up under a shaggy weeping willow. Will was trying to get the ancient cast iron park grill going with lighter fluid and charcoal, and the kids were engaged in a game of what looked to be ultimate frisbee, based on all the running and diving.

"Bobby." Liz said at last, looking up at the big man while cupping the dark downy head of his child. "You're looking good. I think marriage agrees with you." She couldn't resist adding a little saucily.

"Alex agrees with every part of me." he said in such a way that Liz almost blushed, especially as she watched him pull her sister in close, wrap her up and press a hard smacking kiss to the side of her face. Liz had known, she'd always known it would be this way with them. Hot, intense, almost too much to look at dead on, like the sun.

And her sister, her tough, standoffish, slightly angry big sister, well, _she was a woman_. She glowed with health, she was wearing (no _working_) an array of dresses these days, she was showing cleavage, she was accessorizing and perfuming and just throwing her arms around life. To Liz Alex looked delicate and soft melted against her husband. Liz had secretly worried for years at how much her sister needed Bobby. Now she could see that he was just as far gone. It was all there in the cast of his eyes, it was in the curl of his fingers, in the bend of his frame. Liz didn't worry anymore. This man was deeply in love.

But there was more to this exchange. There were things Liz couldn't know, things private to these two that made it even more potent. Liz couldn't have guessed about Alex's frustration and annoyance a short hour ago. Liz couldn't have guessed that the couple were struggling with honesty. Nor that this embrace was Bobby silently telling Alex he was sorry, that he would do better, that he loved her more then anything and that he wanted the world to know it. And judging from the way Alex relaxed into him, she understood.

"Get a room!" came a bellow from across the busy park. It was Jack. Without looking Alex knew her brother's inappropriate voice. But Bobby didn't spring away (as he once might have) instead he gave Alex another kiss this one soft on her forehead and he kept her against his side as they walked over. This, Alex thought, this possessive display in front of the family was new, and it made her heart sing. They were married sure, but the road to recovery, to giving and receiving love was still a long and winding one.

"Hey everybody." Bobby said smoothly, setting down the red cooler with a thump on a clutter free corner of the picnic table. Bobby for his part had always been a wee bit uncomfortable in the loving messy embrace of Alex's family. He was an alien to this kind of affection. He would catch himself occasionally planning what he might say or do in advance and that made him feel like a fraud, like an actor struggling for authenticity.

"Dad." he said to Mr. Eames, dipping his head, giving him special deference. And that single word, so loaded and loving, touched a spot in Bobby's mind. It took him back to last spring. And to how Johnny had sat him down just before the wedding...

_**His suit was beige linen, worn with an open necked white dress shirt, a flower in his breast pocket and top siders on his feet just like they'd agreed, smart but relaxed. A yacht club wedding. They weren't yacht people per se, but it was a stunning location that welcomed small parties on short notice and the price had been right. And when that morning dawned brightly they knew they'd done good. The whole environment was one of clean, clear light. The water shimmered, the fresh white hulls bobbed to a secret beat, and a handful of guests (30 or so) assembled on the back green.**_

_**Alex had worn white because to her white meant wedding, even though she was perhaps the least virginal woman on the planet. Oh the things those eyes had seen. And of course her 'impurity' was compounded by the child growing inside her, the apple of her abdomen - round and ripe and treasured. Alex wasn't ashamed. No she was proud, to be doing this, having a child with the man she'd loved so dearly for so long. In honour of that, she'd worn a very simple white gown with sheer lacy layers that clung to her.**_

_**Moments before they walked down the aisle, in a hyperventilating anxiety ridden spell Bobby stole off to find a bench out of the fray. Just as he was tucking his head low into the crash position he felt a hand on his shoulder.**_

_**"Bobby." A harsh voice barked.**_

_**"Mr. Eames." His voice an octave higher he sprung to his feet in alarm.**_

_**"Sit."**_

_**He'd dropped back down like a sack of flour. The man had power over him.**_

_**"I just wanted to tell you something before the big moment."**_

_**Bobby nodded quickly.**_

_**"This is my baby. My baby girl…"**_

_**"Sir…" but Johnny stayed his nervous expulsion with a soft hand.**_

_**"Don't tell the others," he whispered lowering down, "She's my favourite, my heart walking out there in the world."**_

_**"I'll take care of her. Don't worry." Suddenly Bobby felt 20 years old and green. "Don't worry sir." He felt positive that he was about to be threatened or warned.**_

_**"I know you will. I know you will son. Even when she won't let you." His voice so earnest "I just want you to know that… You're in here too now." he pressed his chest. "I don't think you believed it before." He eyed the younger man softly with the wisdom of age "I don't think you believed you were family. But pretty soon the law will say you are and I'm happy this day is here."**_

_**Bobby had been stunned. He'd been humbled. The older man gripped the bench and pushed up to leave saying, "I'll give you a moment."**_

_**Bobby reached out shakily blindly and grasped the patriarch's cuff, it was the first time he'd ever touched Mr. Eames "Thank you. Thank you." He rushed out again, "For making me feel welcome all these years for opening your homes." he'd never said it in this way, with the weight of all his emotion and love behind it. It was a long time coming "Mr. Eames I…"**_

_**Bobby was cut off abruptly, "Dad." The man barked turning away, "From now on it's Dad." **_

And that was how at age 51 Robert Goren had come to have a father. A real one. One that loved and cared for his children. One that called and asked to talk to him, one that was interested and wanted to know and savoured all the details with undisguised pride. Bobby had never stopped calling him dad.

"Captain Goren." the old man looked fondly at his daughter. A captain in his house. He loved it.

"Hey dad." Alex smiled. She was, Captain Goren. After 25 years in the PD she'd decided to take Bobby's name. Sure lots of old timers still called her Eames, guys that knew her dad, people from 1PP. But she'd only ever been Goren at the 34th. After being by his side for 13 years, she'd had to. It was the greatest tribute. Besides part of her loved bringing him back that way, especially when she was shit disturbing with the higher ups. "Goren!" they'd roar and she felt she was doing him proud. And in moments of quiet reflection she wondered at how easy the choice had been. How happily she'd surrendered Eames in favour of Goren. She'd never been Mrs. Dutton. She knew now - though it was silly and sentimental and a bit new agey - that she'd been waiting (her whole life) for Bobby.

"How's my other princess." he gestured for his granddaughter. Johnny Eames didn't stand, he was pretty much content to let the world rush by around him these days.

"Busy, busy." Alex laughed as Liz reluctantly parted with the soft bundle of baby.

"Kiss? Can I have a kiss?" The gruff older man entreated his eyes soft, the and the small girl obliged mouth open, aim inaccurate, the result being lots and lots of drool. Everybody laughed and Alex who could draw a camera like a gunslinger got another candid beautiful photo. And, just in the nick of time, as Imogen slipped off her grandpa's lap to explore this new great wide world.


	12. Chapter 12

They drove back to Liz's house later that evening for the pièce de résistance, the fireworks. Everyone was assembling in the backyard when they arrived. They picked a spot adjacent the fire pit and Bobby leaned against the trunk of Liz's black cherry tree and tucked Alex into him (their intimacy at warp 5). Alex didn't peep about all of this public touching and loving, she was in heaven. _This_ couldn't be rushed. Bobby'd had to come to this on his own. He had to lose his inhibitions and open himself to intimacy. Alex had waited patiently for this breakthrough, during years of family gatherings and over thirteen months of marriage and this was the first time they'd achieved her secret wish.

Her family spread around on blankets and lawn chairs of their own. Her dad dosing just a little in his lounger. It was dark now and Liz was doling out juiceboxes to the children and beer and glasses of Sangria to the adults. The children all 6 of them (Nate and Ryan and Chloe and Louise and Grace and Jared) raced around with sparklers, still high on sugar (and getting higher). Twittering with excitement asking "When will the fireworks start?" for the umpteeth time.

"In 10 minutes." Arianna, Jack's wife, told her little girl Chloe smoothing the childs almost unearthly white blonde pigtails.

"I feel as excited as her." Alex grinned over her shoulder and Bobby nuzzled her neck making her squirm and giggle.

"Just 8 more minutes. Do you think you can wait?" he teased.

"What is with you two?" Jack shook his head as he walked by.

"What are you, the affection police?" Alex shot back.

"Just wondering if we're going to get some news or something."

Alex frowned.

"A new addition." he clarified mocking a pregnant belly.

"Oh shut up." she flung at him and would have flung her sandal too if she could have been guaranteed a clean strike, there was too much potential for collateral damage. "He is really driving me nuts today." She said to Bobby leaning back against him.

"He might be on to something." Bobby whispered only for her. Her jaw loosened in surprise. He was different today. Another baby? They'd resigned to one and with good reason, Alex was a year older, a year closer to 50. But at the same time she understood the sentiment, on this warm night, wrapped in his embrace, the refreshing vibrancy of the children, the fireflies pulsing playfully, the world felt like a wonderful place you wanted to share.

She looked down into the bassinet beside them, it was a must for evenings such as these to bring the portable bed along. Immy was sleeping on her back in a tangle of wildly coloured soft blankets, her small chest rising and falling. She looked like a decadent little maharaja in her tiny kingdom, on a bed of bright sari's. She looked treasured. Alex had found that this was her addiction (every mother had one), acquiring unique blankets and little loveys and treasures to tuck under and around her girl, little things to make her comfortable. Maybe it was because - and Alex didn't like analyze this too deeply - they spent their days apart. Was it a guilt response? Or a fetish? Or just a spiritual grasp of the physical things that bind us to another human being, like a wedding ring, or her thin gold chain and cross. Maybe all of the above. Alex had found these particular blankets (the ones around Immy tonight) on Etsy, they were artisanal and handmade, one plush, one crocheted and one silkscreened. She had tore them open with excitement the day they'd arrived at their Brooklyn home via UPS.

Now Alex let her hand plump them, adjust and fit them to the curve of her baby's body. She decided not to follow up on Bobby's flip comment about a another child. Some conversations needed a large glass of wine and complete privacy. And just after that thought, with perfect timing, the sky exploded into shards of shooting colour and a cheer rose up.

And for long moments they just sat in a loving embrace transfixed by the display above. The only communication came with each musical change when Bobby whispered the name of the composition and creator.

""Music for the Royal Fireworks" by Handel" he murmured and she felt his fingers slide down a lock of her hair and then rest on her bare arm. "Ich liebe dich." he whispered.

"What does that mean?"

"It means I love you, in the language of Georg Friedrich Händel."

"What has gotten into you today?" She turned more fully to face him and let her fingers trip over his rough chin and cup his jaw.

"You."

"Hmmm?"

"You inspire me to be better." he said his face turned up to the sky. She watched the colours from above reflect on the canvas of his skin and the light bursting in his eyes. She loved this man. It stole her breath.

""Polovetsian Dance" by Aleksandr Borodin" he pressed the words into the curve of her ear his breath a warm puff.

"Four Seasons - Summer" by Vivaldi" he continued on and on with each shift in tempo. And to Alex each name felt like a love letter to her. She liked to tease him about it, but his knowledge seduced her and his affection for information, his impactful, beautiful way of sharing made her a better woman.

She would never forget today.


	13. Chapter 13

It was early, a couple of minutes shy of 7am on Monday morning. The sky was a palette of greys. It looked like rain and it felt like rain too. The air passed heavily between clothes and skin, an invisible adhesive. Alex moved quickly up Broadway and ducked into the cool dry precinct, climbing the stairs one storey to her second floor office. She had just enough time to set down her bag, freshen up the coffee in her travel mug and launch her email account when the call came in.

It was a big one. An explosion in Hudson Heights. Her guys were dispatched and all uniforms on local patrol redirected. The feds would be there in a heartbeat, jurisdictional lines would be blurry until they figured out what this was (a bomb? a gas main? terror?) but the cops of the 34th precinct, they would be there first.

Out on the street, a few blocks over, a few moments earlier a townhouse had erupted. It sent a black fiery ball straight up and disintegrated at the back. Flames, orange, yellow, red, blue flicking and licking, pushing and rushing so vivid against the greyscape of city and sky. They shattered every window and threatened all the neighbours. It went from three, to four to five alarm in an instant, making short snacks of everything nearby and terrorizing everything just out of reach. Passersby were in disarray, some knocked to the ground some rendered deaf and dumb from shock and sound.

Response time: under 2 minutes.

The whir and whine and the jarring whoot of the emergency vehicles ricocheted off the glass and brick of the buildings, making a noise as loud (if not louder) then the explosion itself. First responders: in New York that wasn't just a quaint descriptor, it was a religion. Good samaritans had barely dropped their coffees or closed their gaping mouths before firetrucks had screeched up and unleashed volleys of foam and water, and the ambulances (only seconds behind) were soon swallowing the injured on stretchers. And all this, all this turmoil, all this trouble, had taken place right in the heart of the 34th.

Alex was on.

This was a defining moment.

She listened to the scanner from her desk. She didn't have to move, strictly speaking. She was within her rights to finish her watery squad room coffee. She delegated these days she didn't chase. But some calls were unique enough, far reaching enough, to be worthy of everyone's attention. She paused and debated going down to join the fray. Something was niggling at her. She pushed back from her desk, thinking hard turning the address over in her head. It sounded so familiar. "183 Corsica. Hmmmm, 183 Corsica Street." And then she knew, and she bolted forward tipping the desk in her haste, knocking papers to the floor banging her thigh so hard she limped through her office door, but it didn't matter. Nothing mattered. **_She-had-to-get-there._**

Her mental GPS had zoomed in on the location. Corsica Street it was a residential road that ran behind her daughter's daycare centre. Maybe number 183 would end up being blocks away but she didn't care, _**Go-go-go-go-go-go!**_ Her mind shouted and nothing else could edge past that word. "Scene." She yelled as she hustled out the precinct door. Terror in her heart she pressed frantically at her cell phone. Hitting speed-dial button labeled **Tamara** over and over and over and it went to voicemail and to voicemail and to voicemail.

"Oh God! Tamara." she screamed in the cabin of her requisitioned Ford Edge, the kind with POLICE emblazoned on the side. She set sirens to blaring and skidded out of the lot. "Oh God! Tamara. ANSWER ME!" Tamara always answered. _Tamara always answered _because her cell was clipped to her belt. And Alex started to shake and then the tears started. She didn't even know if anything was wrong and she was balling. She had to face a wall of cops in minute as Captain Goren and she was balling. It was instinct. _She just knew._ After all this time she was instinct walking and talking. She did the best she could to calm down, she raked her knuckles across her wet cheeks and arrived at the daycare.

Her heart plummeted. It was cordoned off.

At that moment to became clear, billows of thick black smoke clear, that the explosion had occurred in the house directly behind. Her eyes alighted on Constable O'Tarry.

"Ed." She shouted "Ed. What's the status?"

His eyes widen at the sight of her, hair wild from panicked shaky fingers run through it, her eyes red rimmed. Even though she'd managed to regain herself, even though her cop face was in place, even though she was barking orders, she couldn't quite fool the world.

"The building, 183 Corsica to the rear of this one exploded, possible gas line. No word yet. 4 casualties. One from this residence." He gestured at the daycare. "Looks like the home owner."

"The children!?" she demanded but she was already headed past the tape.

"Ma'am! Ma'am you can't go in…" Came a foreign voice, and she held her badge so close to the man's face that his eyes crossed.

"Captain Eam… Goren…." she almost forgot her own name, she was so far past anything but seeing her child.

"I don't care who you are, the building is structurally unsound."

"Where are the children? Where are the children that were inside?!"

"All three children have been accounted for."

"FOUR!" she screeched "There were FOUR. Where are they?" she couldn't breathe she couldn't, she was suffocating right here, 5 steps beyond the yellow tape surrounded by EMTs because she knew, s_he just knew._

"There." he gestured at an ambulance realizing that less was more.

She staggered in that direction past body bags, one she guessed containing a friend_._ She felt a ripping, a tearing, something splitting her in half and feasting on her guts. She peered into the emergency vehicle, three babies, no Imogen.

"Where is the other baby!" she demanded.

"There was no other baby, we checked every inch, closets, cabinets…"

"You must have missed…"

"No. Room by room. Every inch, I was there my…"

She tuned the man out because then she was walking, then running back to the site.

"The yard." she yelled. Her thoughts and speech had stopped collaborating. "With Tamara. Check the yard." She yelled "My daughter! Check the backyard again." her voice had a hysterical edge.

"Cap? Your kid?" The constable drew himself up abruptly. He immediately summoned some help. Someone who would know.

"There's nothing lots of glass, some masonry…" the tech shook his head concern etching his brow. "No children. We can't go back…" The fire was still blazing.

Alex grabbed her side it felt like someone was turning a knife there, her breath came jerky and fast. **_What now? Oh God what now!? _**She spun whirled round and round until vertigo set in looking for someone anyone that might have her daughter. Some cop, some tech, some bystander, anyone.

Then, sweet relief.

Waves of beautiful relief.

_**Of course. **_

_**Bobby.**_

_**Bobby must…**_ She slammed her quivering digits onto the virtual buttons of her phone.

"Do you have her?" she yelled when he answered.

"Wha… Who… Alex?"

"Do you have Imogen?"

"No. No. You have her. You took her to…."

But she had already dropped the phone, her knees had already buckled and didn't remember much after that.

* * *

"Alex."

Nothing.

"Alex talk to me."

_**Bobby.**_

"Is she okay?" Alex whispered.

"She isn't here."

"Where is she?"

"I don't know."

"Oh." it was short and succinct but she breathed the word out on her last, rolling over on the stretcher drawing her knees to her breasts. Not fetal, no, a complete ball, a potato bug on white sheets.

"Sh - sh - she has to be somewhere, she didn't get hurt, her things are gone. She is not dead." his voice caught and he swiped at his face quickly. "Alex get up. Please get up and help me." he begged.

"Tamara is dead." Alex offered her voice low and slow.

"Imogen is not!" Bobby shot back, shouting and shaking the metal frame of the bed trying to rouse her. _**She can't be.**_

"Who would… who would have taken…" her voice rose up, grey and reedy as if off the end of a cigarette then it dissipated.

"I… I" Bobby stumbled and something in those two brief syllables drew her back to earth. She turned her head slowly to look at him. Everything was slow and quiet to her, everything in the world moving at the speed of a tortoise.

"I..." he tried again.

"You what?" she felt life again, her eyes narrowed, and blood flooded her limbs with an unpleasant prickle. There were secrets here. She smelled them. He was made of them, his brown eyes tortured with them, his back bowed with them, his navy blue suit (her favourite one) was barely containing all the secrets.

"You what?" Suddenly she was yelling.

"I… Nicole."

"WALLACE?" her voice broke on a shout.

"I saw her."

"You're dreaming."

"I talked to her." he shook his head "Same old games, 'I'm not Nicole, I'm Melissa." he mocked, "but it was definitely…" he couldn't say another word because in an instant, like a ninja, she had sprung to her feet and then hit him so hard across the face that it turned him. He thought his eye had been loosed from the socket. And (what he could see of her) he didn't recognize. She was so distorted with pain and fear and rage.

"What?! Are you fucking serious?!" she screamed "She's back and you didn't tell me? And now she has my baby!" she wrapped her arms about her middle and sobbed openly "She kills children! Oh God, oh God, oh God…"

He lay a soft hand on her shoulder. And she lunged at him like a feral beast. "I will kill you!" she screeched and someone grabbed her around the waist. A mysterious arm, the kind that always seems to find a waist just seconds before the point of no return. Her facade of civility was gone, she was flailing and kicking and fighting . "I will kill you!" She screamed because his betrayal cut to the bone. "You are dead to me if she hurts my child!"

He took a step back, he almost tripped and fell. _**She doesn't know what she's saying, she doesn't know what she's saying, shedoesn'tknowwhatshe'ssaying**_ he chanted in his head.

"Ma'am I will have to sedate you if you don't calm down." an even baritone rumbled in her ear, "You're going to hurt yourself. Or someone else." he (this mysterious he) had her arms pinned to her middle. Probably, Alex thought in a brief moment of lucidity, because she had a gun and was screaming like a lunatic. Mystery man with the iron grip had lifted her right off the ground to hold her still. In her mind her tactical training flooded back. She knew she could get out of this hold in 4 moves and absolutely annihilate this presumptuous mother fucker. But the second the vicious violent thought occurred all of the emotion and energy drained out of her. She flopped forward heavily as though the devil had been cast out.

"My baby." her cry was low and plaintive and at that moment mothers the world over stopped what they were doing for just a second without knowing why, without ever seeing or meeting this broken woman on a New York street. "My baby."

"Let me." Bobby dared to come close gesturing the man away.

"Are you su…"

"Yes. Let me." he moved to his wife. He pulled her sagging heavy form to him and she didn't resist at all. He swung her legs up and carried her behind a makeshift triage partition and sat heavily on a folding chair and held her.

And everything stopped.


	14. Chapter 14

**Amber Alert.**

2 words with deep meaning.

Every cop in the city on notice. Every citizen's awareness heightened courtesy of the Emergency Alert System and it's storm watch style banners. They scrolled across all local TV programming and announced themselves with a loud beep before every radio newscast. The FBI worked in tandem with local PD. The borders were on notice, as were the train stations, bus stations and airports. And favours were being called in on every level. That was the thing about being a legacy cop, about being a captain, about working for the FBI, about having an acclaimed (combined) 56 year career in law enforcement, people didn't offer lip service to your cause, they _really_ wanted to help. Cops everywhere knew their names Goren and Eames, and just _got it_.

As the texts flowed in, Alex beeped with upsetting regularity. She kept her phone on just to hear, just to get the updates from her detectives, even though each update assaulted her. It felt like her cellphone was delivering shock therapy.

_*PING* 300 tips citywide so far_

_*PING* Feds are closing in on a house in lower Manhattan_

_*PING* Didn't pan out. Viable sighting at Penn Station, MTA cops closing in_

And on and on and on and on it went.

Alex had managed to pull herself together sometime in the hour following the worst news of her life. And 2 hours after that (after her wildly swinging, emotional outburst) she'd found a dirty public restroom in a bodega a block away. Over a dingy sink she'd brushed her hair, reapplied the makeup tears had washed away and slipped on some sunglasses. Then she'd gone back to the scene.

She tramped through the twisted metal and sharp wooden spikes, the remnants of 183 Corsica Street. She wore a couple of enormous steel toed boots, that were part of a kit in the trunk of a police car she'd never driven before today. And she wore a regulation bright yellow hard hat. She skirted around the place where her friend had died. Yes, Tamara had died in the blast. It wasn't speculation anymore. Alex had dialled the cell number - her daily lifeline to her baby girl - and listened as it rang eerily from inside the black body bag. Then, because she had to (but because it was the very last thing she wanted to do) she took a deep wet breath held it and unzipped the vinyl sac. The left side of Tamara's face was torn to the bone from the projectile glass. What was inside that bag was not the vivacious thirty-something girl she'd left Imogen with, just a destroyed anemic looking shell. Alex had probably spoken to Tamara more then her own family most days, but she didn't cry then. She would do that later and that was a promise.

Then Alex had floated (she had no weight, a breath could blow her away) into the blackened brick and mortar of the 'safe place' where she had left her child. The rooms were in tact and they were proclaimed sound enough for law enforcement.

Alex knew Imogen's schedule by heart.

Introductory singalong.

9am snack

10:00am nap

11am walk through the community

11:50 lunch time (Alex tried to arrive at noon on the days she could)

12:30 stimulated play (cruising practice, or food sorting, or finger painting or bubble blowing or outdoor toys - weather permitting)

1:30 nap time

2:30pm feeding

3:00 free play (tummy time or bouncers with music)

4pm snack

6pm pick up (not that her day always ended at 6pm, but after that there was often an elaborate dance with Bobby to fill the gap in care.)

Alex had loved the way the children's time was budgeted into chunks, and the way each week had a theme. It had been so exciting to bring Imogen in and to tell her (with that big eyed, dramatic, borderline falsetto that every parent knew) about the fun she was going to have. Tamara had helped greatly by hanging banners proclaiming things like: "BUG WEEK!" And all of the effort had spoken to Alex of an engaged, loving environment, treating the babies as people rather then responsibilities.

Now Alex walked through the schedule all alone, in the sad singed low rise. Moving from ghostly activity to ghostly activity looking for a hint, a clue as to what had gone on. Taking a baby, it was the most silent crime. Alex imagined her daughter when the explosion shook the residence. She imagined Imogen raising startled dark eyes and then she imagined her unanswered cries. She imagined Tamara alone in the backyard (though she would never know why) only to be hit side on by flying glass and brick. It was almost too much to take. She braced a trembling pale hand against the wall, hit by wave after wave of pain.

* * *

Bobby haunted the site. He tried to grab Alex's eye but she never even hinted at recognition. She'd flown off his lap almost 2 hours ago. She'd come to consciousness and realized where she was, sitting on the enemy. She'd twisted away from the contact as if he were vile, as if he were something foreign and putrid. So he'd sat there alone behind that partition just staring at the bright white of it. This was shock. He knew it intellectually even as it was happening. He'd been here before. Alex wasn't in his arms anymore but there they were held aloft and rigid and he couldn't… _quite … get them … to …. go down… _His heart, his heart was running a marathon his body wasn't invited to.

"Don't move." an EMT had told him after pressing a stethoscope to his chest. And Bobby found that that wasn't going to be a problem because he couldn't. He'd tensed his legs to push up and found it was like trying to dead lift a thousand pounds.

She'd done it.

Nicole had really done it.

She'd destroyed him.

**_"Tell Bobby he's the only man I ever loved." _**

Being loved by Nicole Wallace meant death.

This was how she loved.

**_Imogen._**

What was she doing to his child?


	15. Chapter 15

"They were good." Scott Dunne an investigator from Con Edison (the local gas company) had told her. "But not good enough. It looks, it feels, it smells like a main leak." he gestured from where they stood outside the yellow tape. "But it was tampering." he caught her eye in explanation "We've been fighting the deteriorating pipes."

Alex nodded, "Like in Harlem."

"Right." he adjusting his hard hat. Harlem, the scene of a catastrophically explosive gas leak. 8 had died when an apartment building had come down just months earlier. Alex remembered it had been all over the news. "The pipes are getting old. They're mostly cast iron, then add to that the freeze/thaw cycle and the fact that so many were laid in the 1800's, well let's just say we can't replace them with plastic fast enough."

"But not here?" Alex asked because the man was talking freely. Alex was aware that he had a corporation to shield from lawsuits. But she'd looked into his eyes and she felt he was on the level, they were both parents, he understood.

"No not here. This was definitely criminal activity."

Alex was holding it all in. Imogen had been gone for 10 hours now. She wanted to fall over. She wanted to impale herself on a jagged exposed stud and call it done. But she locked her body to keep it upright and struggled to keep her voice even. "So someone chipped away at the pipes where they enter the house?"

"Yeah, looks that way. The marks are less erosion more corrosion. There were also man made marks, tool marks. After triggering the leak it wouldn't have taken much to set off the explosion, maybe an ignitor on a stove, a cigarette, lighting a candle, static. Or hey, maybe the ignition had help too. Makes sense if…" he stumbled over his words a little "If there was a target."

**_Immy._**

Alex looked at her dusty steel toed boots and closed her eyes.

_**Immy.**_

"Thank you." She said hoarsely and tramped away quickly to spare the man her emotions.

* * *

Alex wasn't working this 'case' with Bobby. He was around here somewhere, but he was invisible to her. She couldn't bear the sight of him. And yet in her bones she wanted to collapse into him and share some of this burning fear and sadness. But this was unforgivable. He had done it again. Even now, even married, even this life they had, even this beautiful child they had made mattered less to him then _her._

Nicole.

One whiff of her Burberry perfume, one invitation to come and play and he'd chosen her_ again - _over his own family. Alex had fooled herself into believing that Bobby loved her. She was sure he felt something, but it wasn't love. Not the way he loved the puzzle. Not the way he loved his twisted kindred spirit.

Nicole.

Night would fall in a couple of hours. Alex couldn't stay here in the rubble though she imagined going upstairs and curling up on the rug in the children's bedroom. She imagined never leaving here. But she had to and she couldn't go home. How could she? To that house of lies? Absent of the squeals and coos, and warm little body she lived for. No. Instead she'd gone and found a generic hotel room a few blocks from where she'd last held her daughter and she sat in the centre of a queen size bed wearing wrinkled clothes and a tear stained face. Her breasts hard and engorged with unsuckled milk. Her sister (ever devoted and loving) had tracked her down. She'd come in and (against type) been quiet, ministering without words. And now, well now Liz was sitting statue still on the pull out couch, just watching. **_Death watch_** Alex thought without humour.

For Liz it was a uniquely impotent position, to be so close to her sister and yet so far. So willing to help and yet so woefully ineffective. She'd done all she could after offering supportive touch and all the tea she could brew. She'd become Alex's liaison to the world - fielding the press, gathering the sympathy, communicating with the police. Someone had to be here. For the first time ever Liz wondered if her sister might hurt herself. Might give up. She had taken it upon herself to make sure that didn't happen.

The phone chimed.

"It's Bobby." Liz had held the cell out.

Alex shook her head.

"Talk to him Ally." Liz grasped the whole situation. She knew about the deception, but she also knew that these two would wither and die without each other.

Alex shook her head again.

"Bobby. Maybe later okay?" Alex heard Liz deliver gently. But she didn't hang up, instead she reprised her role as the go between. "He just wants to know where we are."

Alex swung on her, furious and gave Liz a look that cut deep, slashing her arm harshly through the air and mouthing "No." Then she listened without remorse to one (awkward) side of the ensuing conversation.

"I know." Liz was saying "I know you do." He was laying himself bare in her ear. He was pleading, saying he needed Alex and Liz believed him. She could hear how hoarse he was, hear the wobble in his voice. She felt her own eyes prickle and her cheeks heat.

But then Liz's glossy eyes collided with her sister and she could see cold rolled steel in the set of her shoulders. Alex wasn't going to relent, she was going to make them both bleed.

"I'll talk to… no… no … I can't… I can't." The younger woman said firmly, decisively at last and disconnected the call. To Liz Bobby sounded... She had no words for the way he sounded. She imagined him alone in the apartment, without his wife, without his daughter. She knew without seeing him that he was sitting in the dark weeping. What an awful situation. Just horrifying.

As the hours crept deep, edging ever closer to dawn Liz was still awake. She lay on the extra firm mattress staring at the ceiling and listening to her sister sob softly. And she prayed. For the first time in years just prayed, all the ones she could think of and some she improvised, over and over and over until she dosed. And then morning came in all it's inevitability, and Liz sprung awake in time to watch Alex get up, pull on a wrinkled blazer, strap on a gun and head to work. Liz couldn't even fathom the dedication.

But inside Alex it was quite simple really. What else could she do? Who else did she know? Where else would she be?

Alex was going to the arms of the one thing that never left her, never betrayed her, and always needed her.

The job.


	16. Chapter 16

Bobby had noboby.

Nicole had won.

She had taken everything. She had laid in wait for years. She had tricked some of the best minds in policing and forensics. Hell, she'd manipulated the building blocks of life. She was God. And he was pathetic, so inadequately mortal, so ridiculously outclassed. He had to give her credit for her patience and for a spectacular takedown. He paced the apartment alone, he couldn't eat, he couldn't sleep. He had walked into the nursery hoping to find solace and had almost thrown up. His memories of Nicole's kills so vivid, poison, she liked poison. He didn't want his daughter to suffer.

_**Poison is a quiet way to go.**_

The thought doubled him over. He managed to drag himself into the hallway. He slid to the floor against the small strip of drywall between the bedroom doors and stayed there all night. He couldn't do anything, but he found he could cry. He hadn't even realized he had functioning tear ducts. But being here alone with only the thoughts of his wife and child - his child, so small, so defenseless - released salty rivulets and they dripped off each cheek and onto his pinstriped shirt.

**_Immy._**

**_Alex._**

Bobby didn't know when the morning came. He didn't know if he'd slept. He almost couldn't move his leaden body. Almost. He'd crawled, actually crawled, to the living room. He managed to swing those dead heavy limbs into yesterday's wrinkled jacket, minus a tie, or a shower, or a shave or anything human really, then stood with great labour.

**_"Oh, this is the poison of deep grief."_**

He still had that card. Those pressed distorted pink lips floating over a taunting phrase. He used it as a page holder in his signed copy of Declan's book: **The Other Killers: Rage and the Feminine Mystique.** At the time Bobby had thought it fitting to bookmark the Nicole Wallace passage with the salvo of her last kill. How wrong she'd been back then, about Frank. There'd been grief to be sure, but deep? No. It'd been as shallow as a paddling pool. And mixed with (he would go to hell for this) a bit of relief. He'd been relieved that he wouldn't have to wonder _when_ or _how_ anymore. Relieved that Frank wouldn't suffer anymore. Frank had been on a collision course with the grim reaper for over a decade. With him gone Bobby realized that there would be no more inappropriate requests for money or big favours in the offing. He could finally move on, albeit alone, truly alone in the world, with only his errant nephew and a few (removed) cousins to call his own. But that wasn't an unwelcome prospect, he'd grown used to solitude.

But now, today, the grief was a million fathoms, no a trillion deep. Now his mind, his body, his very soul was under siege. Reality was harsh but his imaginings were debilitating. He wondered if Nicole had an explosive surprise in store for him as well. He wondered if he too might blow up one evening, taking this dreamy life (that had been too good for him anyway) with him. At this point part of him welcomed the sweet oblivion death would provide. But no, if he was thinking it then Nicole had as well, and she would want him to _live_. To live with his loss. To slowly decay inside of his moving breathing body.

**_I'm supposed to be at work._** The idiosyncratic thought broke in, his mind looking for an escape from this relentless agony. He had called yesterday to tip them to Melissa Baird. He had hoped, _prayed_ she might be at home - in her suburban farce - waiting for them with Imogen. But the house was dark and empty. And the county clerks office had said that 'Melissa' wasn't expected back for a whole week.

Today he didn't bother to check in with Newark. He didn't care. He didn't care about anything but his family.

_**Go ahead. Fire me. I've been there before.**_

He assumed they knew why he was AWOL he assumed that they watched the news and that there was some kind of leave for moments like this. The _'your life is in shambles'_ leave.

On autopilot Bobby locked the apartment door, walked two blocks to the subway station and found himself (many missing moments later) back at the scene of the crime. When he arrived at the blown out shells of buildings the sun was just peeking up over the horizon. Dawn. A new day without his baby. He panned for Alex. His eyes desperately darting around the wasteland seeking her. He was lost without her.

_In fact if he didn't see Alex in the next ten minuteshewould… _And then like a prayer answered, there she was. On site, in safety gear, moving beside a similarly dressed man, listening to him intently. Bobby watched her lower her head and move toward him without knowing it, right passed where he stood with the other civilians.

"Alex!" he flagged her. "Alex!" he felt uncomfortably like a groupie calling out to a beloved star. He was on the outside. Robert Goren - former ace detective - was on the '_you're a nobody'_ side of the tape. She stopped and looked at him for the first time in almost 24 hours. He couldn't read her because with sunglasses (yes even in the dark she wore sunglasses) and trademark solemnity she wanted it that way. "Alex talk to me." he pled.

She stopped inches from him and raised her eyewear to reveal red, sad eyes and coldly said "No." then turned her back and kept walking. But he wasn't going to let up. This wasn't the phone and she couldn't dispense with him by pressing a button.

"Yes." He followed her back to her SUV. He stopped her there. He captured her there. She raised her hand to block his touch and he grabbed her wrist firmly. He took her sunglasses off and her hard hat and dropped them on the roof of the car. Then he put his big hands on her, her shoulder, her hip because he needed to feel her, all warm and alive. He felt the tension in her every muscle, she was winding up to take another swing at him, but he didn't care. Being bruised and beaten by her was better then being alone. Besides he deserved it.

"What are you doing?" she demanded, so aware that even devastated and furious she had to try hard not to react to him.

"Touching my wife."

"You're nothing but a liar."

"I was... I was afraid I was hallucinating when I first saw Nicole. Then the second time I - I d- don't know why I didn't say anything. I just wanted her to disappear." She gave him a look of the deepest betrayal, lips parted, breath choked. Then she struggled to get away she slammed her forearm into his abdomen. She couldn't think about this right now. _She didn't want to._ Only one thing mattered, her daughter.

But he held on tighter.

"Let me go!" She demanded and the words sounded like murder, like she could kill him. **_Twice! He'd seen Nicole Wallace, twice._** "You fucking bastard."

"Get it out." he urged low and gritty. "Get it all out and then forgive me." he held her firmly against the vehicle and barely a whisper could pass between them. "Forgive me." he begged.

"Fine. I'll get it out. You want to hear what I think? I think that you put that sadistic bitch, and your decade long cat and mouse game before your own child." she turned her face up to look into his eyes. " I think you're a horrible father! I think you're with the wrong woman!" She was yelling now her eyes bright welling with unshed tears. She wished she could be indifferent, but she _was_ emotion, not even flesh anymore just a hurricane of angst - shaking and weepy and angry, _so angry_. She shoved at his chest once, then again, grunting, turning red with exertion. It was like pushing at a canyon wall.

"You're upset. You can't believe that." he looked at her with wounded eyes. "I chose this life. I fought for you." Then raw anger. "I fought for her! I fought for Immy even when you didn't want her. You were going to abort her. You were going to murder her!"

And that unleashed them, the tears. The guilt was going to drown her. She didn't have any perspective anymore. She couldn't laugh him off as absurd because her guilt had tainted everything. Guilt that she worked long hours, guilt that she hadn't sensed this was coming, guilt that once upon - a far off - time she hadn't wanted her daughter, had considered never having her. Now she was being punished. God was punishing her for being a bad mother. "I'm a bad mother." And she said it aloud because every weakness, every vulnerability was right there on the surface, worse even, hanging around her neck, a placard for all to see.

He closed his eyes. She was right he was a disgusting human being. What had he done? **_What in fuck am I saying._** He tried to repair the damage. "Don't say that. Don't even think it, you are the best kind of mother! You love her with everything. You're better then me. You're better then me." Alex did everything she could for their girl. Everything. He held her face in both hands "I'm sorry. Don't. Don't cry." He kissed her. Just continuing in a stream, his voice trying to bandage a gaping wound. "You are a good mother. You are dedicated, devoted, selfless. You are a good mother. You're a good mother."

They loved each other. And they hated each other. Together they could soar reach unimaginable heights or crash and burn up to nothing.

She sagged against his chest, deeply conflicted. She wanted to fight and yet the fight was gone from her. She wanted to hate him and yet she loved him. Bobby held her up. He was the only person in the world that knew every part of her. He knew her sensual. He knew her joyful. He knew how she surrendered. How she took defeat. And he knew this look, the look in her eyes when only willpower was holding her upright.

"This is a lie." she tried for one last slash, but she was trying to cut him with a butter knife.

"No. This is love. What we have runs deeper then love. Bashert." he cradled her and she let him. He bent low whispering, "I can't be away from you right now. I just can't."

She stared at up him. But her gaze was shallow and unfocused. He knew she wasn't even here. Lost. She was lost. He had to admit he had never seen her lost. Devoid of personality. He never wanted to see it again.

"We can work this together." He said. "Give us a chance."

"You broke us with your lies." her voice caught. "My child." she whined and gasped. Every moment since Immy had been taken was like this. She was present in one instant and then in next caught in a spiral of dark consuming thoughts.

"Our child." he gave her a little shake "Nicole will not kill her." He tried to spark something in her. Some of her old fight. Her own natural love of the puzzle. It wasn't only him. Sure from the outside looking in it had always been the Goren show, because he was big and awkward and fitful. But inside, in their universe of two, it was a lot more balanced. Her drives and appetites were as voracious as his. And he knew that right now, beneath all this grief there were answers. Ones that resided in their shared past with this lunatic.

"Profile her Alex. Help me."

"Okay." She said eventually. She had to do something. This weepy abject misery wasn't helping anyone. Telling herself that Imogen was gone forever, stabbing herself over and over as punishment, well that was exactly what that bitch wanted. She wanted to divide and conquer. Nicole wanted them both to be useless heaps. Now her mind was turning.

And Bobby saw it turning. **_That's it, that's it..._** He urged silently.

If Imogen were dead, Alex thought, then the game would be over before it began. Nicole hadn't even gotten a taunt in yet. She had more in store for them. "Okay." Alex repeated firmer now.

"Okay?" he sounded giddy with relief.

"Okay to getting our baby back." She sniped "Not okay to us." The clipped words were loaded then fired into his flesh like rounds from her glock, but he would take what he could get. With new vigour, with a mission, Alex pushed past his cloying hands and body. Then she used her badge, her all access pass, to lead him onto the scene.

She was counting (like never before) on the Goren eye.


	17. Chapter 17

"This is where she would have been." Alex said softly running a hand over the wooden frame of the small antique style crib, then she reached low inside, lining the bottom of the infant bed was a nubbly soft pink blanket she had brought from home. It had been a present from Aunt Irene, around the inside edge was a hand embroidered floppy eared bunny striking silly poses and beyond that a raw silk trim.

"Nicole left her blanket." Bobby observed.

"She might not have known it was hers." Alex suggested dreamily, transported momentarily to a world without pain and separation. They knew the morning schedule hadn't gone exactly to plan because the babies had been in the nursery and Tamara had been in the backyard.

"Nothing to chance." he murmured. "She knew." He ran his hand over the soft fabric imagining his girl. He was putting on a calm confident air for Alex but inside he was panicking, this was what it felt like to be trapped in the hold of sinking ship, when your head hit the ceiling and still the water continued to rise, it was swirling at his upper lip now. What if it wasn't Nicole? Or what if it was and she was so angry that she hurt Immy? What if she wasn't caring for her properly? The what ifs immobilized him for a moment.

"Got something?" Alex asked anxiously misinterpreting his stillness.

"Uh no." He cleared his throat then picked up the blanket and pressed it to his nose it smelled like his baby. Something fluttered loose.

Alex snatched at it and caught it in mid air. A small piece of brown parchment. She unrolled it.

**"Tit for tat."**

Definitely Nicole.

Alex looked at the paper in her palm as if waiting for it to do something sing, dance, turn into her child...

"Remember." He urged softly "She'd just been dismissed from Hudson. She was status-less. She mocked my mother and she was mining for more weaknesses and I said..."

"Tit for tat." Alex remembered and was instantly transported there, she was in the observation room at 1PP behind the oneway glass. She could smell Deakins' aftershave. She leaned in and watched their chemistry, the criminal and the cop, their taboo dance of fascination.

"And…" he drew her back.

"And then again in Phoenix.**_" _**the words took her on another journey. Now it was sunny day and she was standing beside Bobby on the front steps of the Chapel residence, she was dwarfed, in the shadow of his giant frame. His eyes were dull, his voice was slow and low and tortured. Gwen's note was in his hand, a threat in block letters on an aged photo of Donny**."'_Tit for tat. Blood for Blood'"_**

All these years we thought it was Declan."she murmured. Once they'd received the heart they'd just assumed Nicole had been a victim and Declan the mastermind.

"It was. At least that was his story, that he lured her to his cabin in the Catskills, said he slit her jugular then he brewed a cup of tea and sat his roll top desk with a fountain pen and wrote to Gwen while she bled out in his bathtub." Bobby had sat across from Declan while he stood gesturing wildly, _holding court_ inside the state psychiatric facility. That day Declan could have just as easily been at a party, or at a podium for all his exuberance. He'd been as giddy as school girl, his eyes glowing his spry wiry frame fairly exploding with glee at how well it had all gone to plan - from the weeks spent absorbing Wallace casefiles memorizing every detail, to investigating her associations, to baiting her with his book, to securing her role in Frank's murder. "He was so pleased with himself with all the little details, sending himself flowers. Aping Nicole, mimicking her style to engage me." He could hear Declan's voice, **_"Genuis Bobby my boy, it was genius."_** As mad as a hatter.

And Bobby cringed because the memories were physical things, brushing at his face, push out of his skull, rhythmically thrumming behind his eyes.

* * *

_**10 minutes later.**_

"So we… we should forget about Declan and focus on that first time." Alex pressed fingers deep into her eyes rubbing. "When you set the rules of the game."

He nodded shortly. He wished he go back in time and tell that young reckless upstart detective not to engage a killer. Regrets, he had more then a few. "Nicole is telling us that this is about family."

"Duh, obviously." Alex was jittery, anxious, trapped in this cop body. After a day without Immy her own skin was a bad fit. Working this personal crisis as a case meant having to be someone she didn't want to be. It meant putting aside everything in order to be reasonable and methodical. It was too much to ask. It was a single-mindedness she couldn't achieve. She was a mother. **_I am a mother, I am a mother, I am a mother._ **She didn't want to lose sight of that for even a second. If she didn't have her baby and she didn't think about her baby didn't that mean that her baby didn't exist? **_I am a mother, I am a mother, I am a mother._**

"No. It's more then that." Bobby blundered on "Alex 'tit for tat' in our context, in ours and Nicol...

"You mean yours and Nicole's." She spat angrily "Leave me out of this bullshit freak show love affair. I was never part of it."

He sighed "Tit for tat is about secrets and family. Mine for hers."

"Okay, okay, okay." She slapped her own forehead a few times to stay present. She was running her fingers through her hair, twitching, pacing. Bobby watched at once riveted and worried. It was an out of body experience. It was like watching himself. _This_ was how he looked to people. **_God it's disconcerting. _**"Why are we going back? Back to things we resolved." So much time had elapsed since that virgin interrogation - Croydon and Ella and Gwen and Frank.

It was like Nicole had lost her mind, forgotten all of the ensuing years. And Frank, Bobby had been the last one wounded in battle. Why did Nicole think she had a right to strike again? To take even more from them. It didn't make sense. Not that it had to, but… Alex's eyes narrowed, "That old nutcase is still on restricted access and medication, right?" Suddenly this felt like Declan again, maybe a diminished Alzheimer's ridden version, with a blown out frontal cortex. A Declan that thought this was 2008.

"Yeah. I checked. Dec is still in the psych ward, only 3 visitors, no mail privileges." **_No magical powers._** He didn't say that, he was in enough trouble. Alex sometimes painted Declan as a bogeyman. But Bobby saw him as exceedingly human. Too human, even in all his deranged depravity Declan had been 'caring' for him. Trying to 'help' him. This kind of love, odd love, off kilter love, south of normal love, to Bobby it felt comfortable.

"So…"

"So turnabout. Now Nicole is mimicking him."

"Why?"

"Something about her partnership with Declan I guess. I'll talk to him."

* * *

_**15 minutes later.**_

"Wait. Wait." Alex waved an angry hand. "How did she game the DNA? DNA is DNA."

This" he drew the talisman from his pocket, "was how she announced herself to me this time. I was on the train. I thought I'd dreamed her. Then I found this on the seat where she'd been."

"And conveniently it's right in your pocket." Alex snorted grabbing it from him. If she knew Bobby (and she did) he'd been obsessing over it. Obsessing, over-thinking, hiding and drinking were the hallmarks of his disfunction. _This_ had been her job for years, during their partnership, keeping Bobby on the rails. A little game called _spot the markers_ if more then one appeared simultaneously then she knew he needed an intervention. But then she'd gotten pregnant, started dreaming of happily ever afters, she'd married him, she'd dropped her guard and… well here they were.

She held it up the talisman and examined it. She pulled out the scroll. "What does this mean?" She couldn't read the language.

"It's a Buddhist chant, a mantra. You repeat it usually to deities for enlightenment and meditation._ Om mani padme hum_. It.. um... purifies darker emotions, greed, pride…" he trailed off.

She rolled her eyes. "The Thai connection again."

He nodded.

"What piece of your life did she co-opt this time?"

He froze. He had hoped Alex would forget that quirk of Nicole's MO. Telling a shopkeeper that she spent week in Oxford chasing boys. Telling a librarian that she was following in 'mummy's footsteps,' telling a florist that she was deeply bereaved - his grief… This time, on that train between Newark and Manhattan, she'd basically drawn a circle around her target and he'd ignored it.

"You." he muttered "She told a seat mate that she was you and that we were soul mates."

"Immy?" she held her breath.

"Yes she talked about her too." he tensed for her wraith. He waited for the spine of a book to crack his ear. He waited for a shrill sewage from her mouth. He waited and nothing. Eventually turned looked at Alex but she just looked down. She busied herself with the ineffectual manipulation of the talisman. The newest scroll easily slid in to the clear glass cylinder same size, same paper, written by the same hand.

"What she's a carrier pigeon now? Messages in tiny bottles? I hate these bullshit games!" Alex raged. This was Alex distilled, Bobby thought, Alex without the energy or inclination to invest in niceties.

"I have no idea why all the subterfuge." he shook his head. "I guess she's always liked little games, she's always buried the truth in riddles."

"The George Hurstwood foundation." Alex said almost wistfully, a Wallace riddle from a time with no stakes. Bobby came as close to smiling as he dared. He knew he could count on her to be right there with him. For the first time he felt the connection with her he craved, mental. He nodded emphatically.

"But what's the relevance?" her frustration was rising. They were just pieces on her board. Nicole owned the game and she was making all the fucking rules. Alex burst, "Tell me about the second meeting. What did she say."

"She asked me a question in class."

"Inside the auditorium?"

He nodded.

That psycho had balls, Alex thought, huge ones. On his train, in his class, the extent of Nicole's mania was humbling. This had taken a long time from planning to reconnaissance to execution.

_**Reconnaissance. Open windows.**_

Suddenly all the unexplained phenomenon, all the raised hairs on the back of her neck, all the gaping windows had a name: Nicole Wallace. Suddenly Alex just knew. She had been inside their house.

"She was in the house." Alex blurted

"What?"

"I just know it. She's been stalking us." Alex could see the days of their lives flipping across his eyes, pages of the calendar, and every second was tainted.

"Tell me." she brought him back.

"I was running the course. I was talking about…" he paused "You sure you want to get into all this?"

"Of course. Spit it out."

He huffed a little at her tone. "I was talking about the diathesis stress model."

"English Bobby." she moaned.

"It's a behavioural indicator. It helps diagnose antisocial behaviour by looking at both nature and nurture. Take Nicole: by using this model her sociopathy combined with the abuse or maybe her genius and the abuse."

"Yeah. Okay. Got it." she fluttered her hand impatiently. "A biological abnormality plus an environmental abnormality equals a monster."

He nodded. God he loved her. She was sharp as a tack. "Nicole put up her hand and asked about twins. Could twins have a different outcome, be identical and raised identically but be good and bad."

"Twins." Alex considered it.

"She didn't have a twin." Bobby asserted. "We checked, Rodgers checked."

"Bobby, this piece of trailer trash from a broken home in Queensland Australia, this product of an alcoholic and a pedophile, had a paper trail that said she was Elizabeth Hitchens a university professor and she managed to fool the dons of Oxford. This is not a normal woman. This is Machiavelli reincarnated. She probably screwed some besotted records clerk and deleted her twin while he was cumming."

He jaw dropped at the crude comment but again he let it go. "The records from her birth, in the 60's would have been on paper, she would have had to bang a lot of clerks…"

"Please." Alex rolled her eyes again. "That whore? She would have been up to the task. And a twin could explain this all of this. A dead sibling. Declan killed the wrong fucking sister."

Bobby had always compartmentalized Nicole. Maybe he'd been biased by her beauty, or given her a pass because of her hard life, or been slightly awed by her fine mind or maybe all of the above combined into one thick putrid green soup. But he was seeing now, for the first time in technicolour, how much Alex _despised_ her. "I cornered this woman. Nicole. Outside the classroom afterward and she made a convincing attempt to keep up the false identity. No accent. She was softer, less assured, but…"

"You didn't believe her, because who the hell would? That is one slippery bitch." He released a relieved breath. He wasn't insane. Alex understood Nicole and she believed him! She hated him right now, but she was the only other person on this planet that got it, that had been along for the whole ride, that wouldn't balk at the twists and turns and mental leaps required.

He was so lucky to have her.

He was never, _ever_ going to give this woman up.

* * *

_**10 minutes later.**_

Her back was to him now. She was staring at the cracks in the walls. They radiated outward from the source of the blast.

"You should have told me. I hate you for not telling me." her voice was tight and gravelly. "I would have…"

"What? What would you have done? There was no crime Alex."

"Background!" she shouted suddenly "I would have manufactured a reason for surveillance." **_Then s__hot her in the face and burned the body._**

"Right. _If_ you even believed me."

"I would have believed you! I would have, because I had a child to protect!" she turned on him and yelled. And then stopped and grabbed her mouth eyes large. _Had _she'd said_ had. _Tears burst forth and threatened to drown her with their ferocity, she sobbed bent and anguished. He stepped toward her "Don't. Don't you touch me."

"I did background." he whispered.

"Really?" She spat drowned and snotty, leaning against the wall for support. "What did you get?"

"A boss singing her praises. He says she's been a dedicated employee at the county clerks office for 12 years. A mortgage with a $289,000 in equity. 3 kids: Josh 9, Adam 7, Shannon 5." he shook his head and whispered. "I don't know how she managed it."

"Maybe she didn't. Maybe all this.. this... is the other one."

"Some Long Island soccer mom is suddenly blowing up buildings and kidnapping…" he stopped on a wave of pain.

"She has a predisposition. Born into that toxic mess."

He shook his head, "No, it's Nicole."

* * *

_**5 minutes later.**_

"Why now?" Alex asked forlornly, maybe to him, maybe to the universe.

"Because I was _so_ happy. Because this is the best my life has _ever_ been." His eyes begged her to see the truth but she turned away from the honesty. She couldn't weaken. She needed him to pay. And he did, his heart smashed on the nursery floor. Bobby fought tears and cleared his throat again "Her level of psychosis doesn't stand up to reason. She eliminates to achieve a personal goal. All of her kills are collateral damage."

"Except Bernard Fremont."

"Except him." he didn't completely agree. Though he held back because his rebuke was semantical and Alex was a blunt instrument today, a blunt instrument looking for something to strike. Bernard certainly had deserved his fate (from Nicole's perspective) but he'd deserved it years ago in the Thai hotel room of an unsuspecting John, not in the stairwell of the supreme court of New York. Nicole had been meting out 'justice.' That meant she could be moral. Returning Gwen had been another moral act. Maybe they tap into that morality somehow.

But Alex was practical and she needed a practical way to apply herself "We need DNA to sort this mess out and we need 24 hour surveillance on the residence of Melissa Baird." She grabbed her cell, her precinct on the line in an instant, and moments later a patrol car dispatched. _**Man hours to man an empty house**_, Bobby was impressed, his wife had power. "This Melissa Baird she has kids?" Alex barked "We need to find them and then we need their blood." She got on the phone again this time with the DA's office.

_**She's a a bit scary**_ Bobby thought.

"I told the feds about 'Melissa' but I don't know how far they ran with it." he said after her call, "I'm not exactly inside the top level meetings these days." Bobby had never felt less effective in his life. He wished he had his badge so he could_** do**_ something for his daughter.

Alex was roiling with anger toward him, but the clouds parted in that instant allowing her a moment of divine clarity. Angry or not, she knew who she was standing beside. This man she'd married he could get confused, he could be malleable, he was often drawn to dark energy but he was also the most intelligent, intuitive, effective cop she'd ever known, maybe in the history of the NYPD.

They needed to use that.

"Tell me what you see." she demanded abruptly.

"Hmmmm?" she caught him off guard, he was wandering, touching, sensing.

"The room. I see something else, I see a place I visit everyday. I see her asleep here. I see Tamara dead. I see Immy being… being taken…" She wiped at her face quickly. "My objectivity is shot. I need… I need you."

So he started to talk. "The blast came from the rear, this room is in the front of the house. Minimize potential harm. The caregiver outside and exposed. Nicole knew the schedule or set a trap. Maybe she sat out there and watched." He pointed to the building across the street a bookstore and above it was a was an apartment and the navy blue patterned drapes were drawn. Alex zeroed in on it squinting then she was moving, on her way to the door.

"Where are you going?"

"Over to that apartment."

"Alex wait stop."

"Why?!" she bellowed and she looked ready to take his head off again.

"We need to finish here," he wasn't used to her skittishness to her undisguised aggression. She had never rushed him or ran off or belittled his observations.

"There's nothing else here!"

"Really? You sure about that?"

"What? What else?"

He moved over to the large towering armoire. The whole room was decorated with heirloom quality furniture, beautiful neutral wall paper, exposed blonde floorboards, and 5 small cribs at angles on a large cosy rug. It had been, for Alex, an exceptional place to leave Imogen. Bobby took a plush elephant in hand and squeezed. It was a patchwork toy, composed of quilt remnants, ticking and florals and fleur de lis. Embedded in the face were two large black buttons.

"Did Tamara use a nanny cam?"

"No. Not for the parents anyway."

He pulled out his pocket knife and slit the belly, he turned the toy out and it's guts were wires and a small box anchored to the to the animal's glossy eyes.

"The cops were all over this place. No one got that?" she was starting to question the competency of these worker bees. This was who she was trusting to find Imogen?! She and Bobby they'd _lived_ their cases, _breathed_ them, they'd never missed a trick.

"Wireless." he murmured, "It could be transmitting anywhere in the world via a secure website. This is traceable." he put the toy down. Walking through his scenario in that detached way he did when he was in the zone. "So she would have to have gotten in, jimmied the front door. Forced entry?" he turned to her.

"No not on the doors. The windows weren't obviously forced but they had so many layers of flaking paint and the wood on one was a bit warped. Tamara was saving up to change all of them to double glazed. We talked about it. She didn't want to go for cheap, she had her eye on the historically accurate sash style."

He nodded.

"She had an alarm system but it probably wasn't armed at quarter to 8 in the morning."

Alex believed emphatically in the goodness of the caregiver. She was positive the woman had been an innocent victim. Alex had gotten to know Tamara over the course of a month before starting at the 34th and leaving Imogen with her. Tamara had a certification in Early Childhood Education. She had been affiliated with the Columbia University psychology department. Her previous gig before striking out and starting her home centre had been inside their private preschool. Tamara's home was pristine and the care and cleanliness had spoken to her character. Alex was so sure her daughter would be safe. But now She knew that security was an illusion.

Bobby looked around some more up at the ceilings. Then down at the floor committing the room to some spacial memory bank. "Have we talked to the other parents?"

"Yes both levels, the feds and my guys. I was on the other side of the glass. Two couples and a single mother."

"I need to talk to them." he said "Let's make that happen now."

They knew that they didn't have the luxury of "soon", or "at a mutually convenient time". They were coming up on 24 hours.

"Okay." Alex didn't question, she was going to pull whatever strings needed pulling, whatever he wanted. He had a hunch and his hunches closed cases, brought back beloved baby girls.

The sadness buffeted her then and Alex stumbled, she almost fell but Bobby caught her.

And he held her until she pushed away.


	18. Chapter 18

Alex had the jurisdiction but bringing in Bobby, a civilian, to run the questioning of the parents that had no precedent. And the detectives in charge of the case (her detectives) they weren't on the guest list. Keeping it 'by the book' was for a smooth trial. But this wasn't about a trial. They had tried Nicole before, she was teflon. Deakins had speculated back then that it was her team of first class lawyers. Alex was sure that hadn't hurt but she knew the real reason. Nicole was elegant, petit, pretty. She painted a picture, the ingenue. She cast a spell. Enchantresses didn't do hard time. At least not in a culture where she her package: that face, that form, that figure were idealized. So this was about getting the job done. Imogen was worth any reprimand, any discipline, _anything_. This little precinct off Broadway was suspending the rule of law, this morning it was Guantanamo.

As it turned out there was no need for water-boarding, the question period was as civilized as a suburban coffee klatch. Sharon and Peter McLaughlin, Sarah and Richard Rebus and Olivia Lyons, all sat shoulder to shoulder in her office, fidgeting, glancing at watches. It was afterall a Wednesday at 7:30am, they were dressed in business casual, it was time for the ritualized dash downtown. Alex swallowed a mouthful of coffee that tasted like resentment. Yesterday she had _been_ these people, today she looked at them from across a great divide. Their babies were all (no doubt) being tightly clasped to the bosom of grandparents or good friends.

"Hello." she managed the pleasantries, but barely, "Most of us have met but for those who haven't I'm Alexandra Goren, captain here at the 34th precinct. This is my husband Robert, with the FBI." She didn't call him an agent, that would be a deliberate misrepresentation. But she liked the acronym. FBI. She liked the way recognition pulled the parents up straighter in their chairs.

"We need to ask you a few questions." he came in smoothly and she receded. She was happy to yield the floor. Alex used a subtly placed hand on the desktop to make it to her chair. She wasn't sure about the integrity of her legs. Over the last 23 hours just breathing took superhuman effort.

"We went through all this with Detectives Reeve and Leery and then again with agents Copla and Dervan." That from single mom Olivia Lyons.

"I am a behaviorist and a father. My take on this will be slightly different."

"We are so devastated about Imogen." Sarah Rebus had dark wells under her eyes and to Alex they looked a sleepless night.

Bobby nodded, he couldn't speak, he couldn't accept condolences. He perched on the corner of her desk, not blocking Alex exactly, but shielding her a little from all this. His imposing frame drew eyes up and away. "Alex and I want to get to know all of you a little more." he played a role, a father late to the game, ignorant in his loving way. "Do any of you work near the daycare? Or was it a close to home solution?"

"We both work in the financial district." Peter McLaughlin offered "We live in Hudson Heights." He was stoic and from Alex's perspective would make an ace poker player.

"I work as a dental hygienist 5 blocks from my daughter Abigail." Olivia Lyons volunteered.

"We're both CPA's we live in Floral Park but we move all over the city for work." Richard Rebus explained. "We chose this location because of Sarah's mother she can pick Lucy up for us 4 days a week."

All of these people were professionals with a certain level of education and sophistication and while Bobby was looking for means and opportunity, he was also looking for exploitable personality traits. From her seat Alex thought Olivia Lyons was clearly the weakest link.

"Alex visits Imogen most days at lunch, to feed her and to be with her. Anyone else here make it to the daycare during the day?"

"I do." Olivia Lyons said. "Usually not until after 1pm, we do a staggered lunch at our office."

"I make visits on the occasional Friday. I have an alternating Friday off but I always seem to end up running errands." Sarah chimed in.

"Generally I can't get back until the end of the day." Sharon McLaughlin said shortly, her demeanour was shades of her husband.

"Have any of you ever seen this woman?" Bobby asked "Anywhere." He leaned in with a picture of Nicole. A few head shakes from intent eyes and craning necks and then the game changer.

"I saw you talking to her, last week." Olivia said and she had Sarah pinned in her sights.

_**Sudden twist.**_ Alex leaned in closer.

The woman stuttered "I… she… Our sons play soccer together."

"What is her name?" Bobby asked.

"Melissa. Melissa Baird. Adam, her son, is over at our house all the time." Sarah Rebus was woman prone to small tangents but they made her likeable and real. "We have 7 year old twin boys in addition to our little Lucy. She was our surprise." The mother's lips quirked. Alex reluctantly identified with that honesty because she remembered her little surprise, a scary surprise for a hardened aging detective had turned into a life changing miracle child. Alex gripped her chest at the thought.

And this captain's objectivity really was shot, because she was behind her big desk rooting for a loser. Alex _wanted_ Nicole's accomplice to be the single mom. It fit, a woman all alone, maybe having a hard time making the rent - vulnerable in a way all of Nicole's past victims had been. But this was why Bobby was running the show, why investigation and not preconception should always order of the day. As it happened Olivia Lyons was a single mother by design, living a free affluent lifestyle, working to stay relevant and engaged rather then for financial reward. She had a large, wealthy, supportive family.

"How long have you known her?"Bobby asked Sarah.

"The Bairds moved in a few houses down…" she looked at her husband "Three?"

"About three years ago." Richard confirmed nodding.

"Melissa's voice drops in and out of an accent." Bobby stated suddenly surprising them.

The woman started a little, and then smiled "She calls it her parting gift, she lived in London as a teenager."

"She has abrupt changes in mood." he stated another fact.

"That woman has a hair trigger," Richard blurted and his wife hit his arm and gave him a look.

"She doesn't." Sarah tried to smooth misconceptions, "Melissa is just passionate about literature."

Peter rolled his eyes and twirled a finger at his temple out of his wife's view.

"Has anyone else had contact with Melissa Baird?" Bobby asked glancing around fitfully crossing and uncrossing his arms.

There was a uniform shaking of heads. Each looking at the other to see the outcome. And with that the room shrunk to this one couple, Bobby's laser focus on Sarah and Richard.

"Melissa and Garrett are good people." Sarah looked confused.

"Good is relative." Alex couldn't help but snap.

"Did she ever ask you to do anything odd? Not even particularly wrong, Just odd."

"Odd is relative." Sarah echoed on a laugh. "We have 7 year olds."

"Like?"

"Buying strange toys, indulging weird hobbies, coping with all the drama."

"In relation to the daycare." Bobby brought her back. "Did she make any inquiries about the scheduling? Has she ever accompanied you on a pick up? Ever given your daughter any gifts for playtime at the centre?"

Sarah shrugged. "Sure she's been to the daycare. A couple of times. Once we met for drinks after work so she came with me. Another time she did me a huge favour and ran into the city to get Lucy. I got tied up at work. I wouldn't let someone unstable be alone with my child."

Bobby and Alex locked eyes at the woman's naivety.

"When was that?" Alex pounced sharply unable to hold back. "The visits."

"I don't know, a couple of months ago the first time, maybe 3 weeks ago the second. That first time she was great. So loving with the children."

"She was with the children?" Bobby felt sick.

"She was in the room, you know how it is, it's hard to resist wiping a drooly mouth or handing back a toy that's rolled away. She has three kids" Sarah gave a worried smile, "Melissa has been there done that. Tamara even gave her a tour."

Bobby took a deep laboured breath. And now they knew how she'd gained entry and rigged the place up with surveillance, no need to jimmy anything, Nicole had walked in cool as you please even been given the grand tour. She'd likely stolen the plush toys (they'd found a second camera during an intensive search). She'd inserted the camera and then returned them on a subsequent visit. A new toy would have attracted too much attention. She'd probably even held or played with Imogen.

Bobby felt it now. He felt how Nicole had savoured every millisecond of her deception. He imagined her twisted mind mapping the players, plotting the points of contact, manipulating all the intersections until the day she had taken their child. Watching, waiting, roiling with hatred. She had infinite patience and infinite restraint when it came to orchestrating a plan. He remembered the trail of deception and dead bodies she'd left just to discredit him with Dan Croydon, she'd used years of acquired contacts and her reach had spanned continents. He was willing to bet that Tamara (and the elderly couple and their border - the residents of 183 Corsica Street) weren't her only victims.

"Melissa Baird can't be found by law enforcement." Bobby informed the group.

"She's in Acapulco with her husband." Sarah volunteered still convinced she was dealing with a regular suburban mother. "It's their 10th year together, tin" she smiled "Garrett was so romantic, he said since number 10 is tin he was buying them tickets on a Boeing tin can to Mexico."

Nicole wasn't on a Mexican vacation, she wasn't anywhere. They'd checked that immediately. Melissa Baird (that identity at least) was still somewhere on the continental United States.

"Where are their children?" Bobby inquired.

"With Garrett's mom and dad, in Islip."


	19. Chapter 19

10:16am.

26 and a half hours missing.

A time for suffering.

Nicole knew that, she hadn't made contact because she was steeping in fantasies of their anguish. **_Just breathe_** Bobby urged himself **_just breathe_**. The Nicole he knew _would_ make a power play, dance on his grave. An email or phone call to whisper vile nothings in his ear. He pled to everything heavenly and earthly that she would embrace her baser nature soon.

Islip local PD verified that the children (God knew whose children) were with Mr and Mrs. Baird (senior). And the grandparents under the weight of the law and inordinate pressure from the DA had consented to the DNA blood test for all three. But DNA tests took time and while they filled gaps in knowledge, they didn't rescue stolen babies.

The theories and questions whipped around in the heads of Goren and Goren (formerly Goren and Eames). Something had to fill the dearth of information.

Could Nicole have found her degenerate match in Garrett Baird as she had with Evan Chapel?

Could the man be aiding and abetting her with full understanding of who she was and what she was doing?

Did he genuinely believe her to be his wife? Or Had he accepted her as a look-alike substitute? And himself as a beard?

Or maybe (because this was all so fucking surreal) it was a dream. The twilight zone. Maybe Bobby thought he had never never seen Nicole, never married Alex, never had Imogen, never left Major Case.

Maybe he'd lost his mind after Frank or no, Tates, it would have to be solitary at Tates because that was the darkest scariest place he could recall.

Maybe Alex hadn't rescued him and this beautiful life was all a dream, something sweet, a coping mechanism to get his diseased mind to the next dose of Thorazine.

Whatever the case, Bobby knew one thing, he was going with Alex. Where she went he would follow. If she wasn't going home he wasn't either. They belonged together. _**Bashert.**_ He'd once said that to her. And he realized it more fully now. He realized that all of it, the good, the bad, the moments of hell and synchronicity they were preordained. And so together they bounced back and forth like rubber balls between the scene and PD, the scene and PD, not speaking. Haunting everywhere they went like phantoms. Just watching. Just waiting. Until…

"Tip! We have a viable tip." Detective Leery yelled from the bullpen, he was after all the official local liaison (when he wasn't being undercut by 2 desperate parents). The feds weren't in the habit of sharing information once they'd seized control, but the sensitive nature of the case, a child of "tender years", with parents in law enforcement and unproven interstate movement, well all that made for more open lines of communication.

"Witness claims to have seen a woman matching Wallace's description with a young child. No 'husband' though." he handed Alex the details as they blew past him out the door.

"What do you think?" Alex asked Bobby as they sped over, she was a ball of nervous energy. And she was, in a very familiar turn of events, driving them in a city issue SUV, to a crime scene.

He just shrugged, he was past words.

Then he took her hand in his and she didn't pull away.

* * *

They arrived at a motel off the highway in Smithtown. This was Suffolk County on the North Shore of Long Island and they were a step behind. Nicole was gone. But she had left them something. Something Bobby had expected, something he'd known Nicole wouldn't be able to resist. Something that vindicated him and confirmed his sanity. It showed up in his inbox as if timed to his arrival. An mpeg. They watched it outside the hotel room, huddled over the impossibly small screen of his iphone. Then they watched it again on the AV in the back of an unmarked federal van.

"Hello Bobby. We've missed you." Nicole smiled warmly into the camera, pale and perfect, accent back in place. Then she raised Imogen into view, tucking the dosing child against her shoulder and placing a soft kiss in her hair. "Don't worry Daddy we're fine. I think we'll head to the coast." she smiled again "Never fear I've learned my lesson, I'll keep a tight hand on this one in the water. I don't want anything to happen to her." She took a moment to adjust her hold and brush bangs from her eyes before adding. "Say hello to mommie dearest for me. I was thrilled to hear you'd married, although no accounting for taste. I waited for an invitation but I suppose in your defense I was dead at the time. You'll be thrilled to know the report of my death was an exaggeration. I'm in the pink of health." She reached down and picked something up, it was a copy of that morning's Times. She stared at the headline. "Oh so heart breaking. Don't cry my darling Captain I'm sure you can mine those follicles, find one more ripe, ready egg. Why don't you just" she shrugged, "make another one." And the screen went black.

And so did Alex.

With rage.

With helplessness.

To be mocked and ridiculed, to have her defenseless sweet baby snuggle into pure evil. She almost screamed, almost raged, almost kicked the flat screen over and jumped up and down on the shards. Almost.

"She's alive." Bobby spoke to Alex's catatonic form. "Nicole doesn't have much time on us and Immy is alive. Everything else is irrelevant."

"She's been following us." Alex was hollow. "All of it, my career, the wedding, all of the news coverage. She's been biding her time."

"It's what she does."

"How can you be so calm." Alex screeched. "She's holding our child while talking about the one she killed!"

"Would it help if I lost it?" he demanded gripping the back of his neck closing his eyes.

"It would show that you're human! Not just loving the hunt."

"I am so tired of this shit." He yelled snapping, "Yes she's fixated on me. Yes she's making it her life's work to torment me. But I have done nothing NOTHING to encourage her. I would murder her with my bare hands right now if I could! I just want my daughter back! I just want my daughter."

Alex raked at wet cheeks. Just when she thought she couldn't cry anymore. And in that moment she saw a future of tears. She saw herself broken, weeping on a dime, greying and curving and lamenting, constantly lamenting. Going forward without Imogen would be dark and empty. And she worried that she would never be herself again. And then she thought in a wild irrational moment maybe Nicole was right. Maybe she need to dust off an egg right now. She wasn't getting any younger. She wasn't replacing Imogen... No she was…

**_What the hell am I thinking?_**

She didn't know anything anymore.

Was that the sky?

Was this the ground?

She ached. She didn't know who she was or what to do with herself. She looked at Bobby. So tortured. He looked like her. He didn't deserve this. The weight of her anger and fear. But what else could she do. Who else could a mother be in situation like this?

"Come on." she barked a little at him and grabbed a fistful of his jacket and buttons and cuff.

"Come? Where…"

"With me." She pulled him by the arm, across busy highway 25 over lanes and median and straight into a dusty old diner that faced the motel. They marched up to a woman at the counter, she was wearing a throwback pastel uniform and a tied apron all of it painfully polyester. If Alex weren't so sad she'd of laughed out loud at the name tag pinned above her left breast. **_Flo._**

"Washroom." Alex delivered without manners and found her wet, tired face was a passport to anywhere. The waitress pressed a key to her hand, a key chained to a spatula.

And she dragged Bobby behind her again.

"What?" He asked when they were alone in the roomy, aged, utilitarian space. It had a white wall mount sink, a white toilet, salmon tiles and corner piled haphazardly with fresh toilet paper rolls, bound brown paper towels and large commercial mop bucket complete with wringer.

_**This will do.**_

Alex shut the toilet lid and pushed Bobby toward it. He didn't get it and he certainly didn't sit.

"What are we doing here Alex? I need to get into that motel room. I need to process the scene. They don't understand her like we..." then her hand was at his belt pulling and undoing.

"What the…" he grabbed the anxious shaking fists where they wrapped around his buckle. "I don't have to go." He expelled on a laugh.

"Neither do I."

Then he got it. And he didn't want any part of it.

"No!" he pulled back.

"Please." she sobbed.

"WHY?"

"I don't know." she said softly. "I need to do something." she pressed against him. She cupped him through his pants, the soft mound of his crotch, weighing, massaging manipulating him, trying to stimulate a response. Scoring very low on seduction, so mechanical and intent.

"I can't." he grabbed her, "I can't even get it up."

"Sit."

"Here? Why here? It's public, it's dirty."

"It's not that dirty or that public."

The back of his legs hit the porcelain bowl and he sat. And he found shortly after that, that her wanting him was still enough, more then enough, just as it had always been. She shed her pants, her underthings but kept on her heeled sandals. Then she reached into his pants, she freed him from his black briefs and she gave him a hand, working his shaft firmly to impressive rigor. Her eyes cast down the whole time, dedicated to only that task.

He laughed breathily without humour "How about a kiss, some eye contact?" He was beginning to feel like a means to an end. But what ends? He couldn't understand her sudden craving.

She slapped a hard wet kiss on his mouth, spreading wide over him, straddling him, lowered her naked hips. She was a little drier then usual and very tight but she bit her lip and pushed down past any pain accidentally kicking the plunger which sat to the rear of the toilet and then scuffing her bare knee on the wall as she closed herself around him. She paused and squeezed, then she moved.

"Why?" He groaned at her slow tight grind.

"Why what?" Her head went back eyes cast up, the glare of exposed tubular fluorescent lights stinging her retinas. And then he knew and he felt sick.

"Because of what she said?" he asked "Make another one?" he stilled her hips.

"No." And the tears rushed down, hanging glinting off her jaw before wetting them both. And then his face was soaked and gleaming too, and his breath caught on a sob. She hadn't seen him cry in years, not since his mom and even then he had turned away. Today he met her eye and he wept. She grasped his chin and pressed her lips everywhere to the wet, to the snot, drinking the salt. "No, because I love you so much. Because she can't break us." she seized him from inside. "Because we can't lose each other. Because I would be" her voice tripped "b- be blessed to have your child again."

"Not because you've given up?" His voice cracked on emotion. If she gave up he, he didn't know what he would do.

"I will never give up." She said it with steel, a sword's edge, sharp enough to cut without thrust. And he surged inside her, he filled her, he went from flaccid to rebar. He sunk his short clipped nails into the white flesh of her bum, and gave them what they both needed. Lifting and dropping her small frame. Bucking against her velvet flesh and falling back down to cold hard ceramic.

Bobby and Alex and their secret life-affirming passion.


	20. Chapter 20

She had taken him in a moment of weakness.

"Make another one."

He'd been right. She had lied. She had told the truth too of course - but she had lied. She had been driven to him by those inhumane words. She had been driven to pounce, straddle him and then take him rough and wrong. But so right too. She had actually begged as she moved her body around his, begged that his seed would take root in her. Desperation did strange things to a person and only time would tell if the universe had heeded her silly, selfish plea. It was ridiculous now that the fog had cleared. As if one human being could so easily replace another. Every single child was the whorls of a fingerprint never to be duplicated.

But Alex didn't regret uniting with her husband in that gritty tryst, even though it had been compelled by pain. How could she? It didn't matter what passed her lips, it didn't matter if she spewed poison at him.

Bobby was it for her.

She loved him (she hated him) _she loved him_.

And anyway, she had come out stronger. Suddenly, miraculously she had regained a little of the clarity she had lost over the last 26 hours. She had a new confidence in them, in the power of their connection. Bobby was potent. He always left her a little tipsy, a little dizzy, a little euphoric. And like most drugs his effect was bound to wear off, she knew she would crash hard when her endorphins settled down, but now she understood that they were better together.

After the act, the sex, he hadn't wanted to let her go. And they sat flesh locked looking at one other a little uncomfortably, a little longingly. After all in that singular moment of physical bliss they had forgotten everything but the texture of each others bodies and the peculiar joy of penetration. Eventually, because of an ache radiating from her thighs and the awkward bow of her legs, Alex had run loving thumbs over his eyebrows, placed a soft kiss to his mouth, and stood as gracefully as she could. She had moved to the sink and wrinkled her nose at the prospect of washing up in this restroom, rubbing her tender parts with coarse recycled paper. And then he was behind her in the large frameless mirror and they just stood there looking at one another in the glass. It was brutally honest. The harsh greenish cast of the overhead light, aging bodies, a few extra pounds, the salty white crust of tears shed and dried, a sleepless night, no makeup, a day old beard, the _**crushing weight** _of mental agony.

This was the face you only showed your deepest love.

This was the truth about life.

* * *

They made their way back to the motel, where Imogen had been less then two hours ago. They were stopped at door 2E by a generic looking man in a generic grey suit who shook his head shortly. Even Alex's badge didn't budge his resolve and neither did her fury because she unleashed a vicious lashing on him.

"Do you have any idea who the fuck you're dealing with…." She hadn't meant to make herself sound like a rock star or the president. She'd actually meant that she was a mother who'd as soon look at, as garrotte, anyone that stood between her and her clues.

"Federal juris…"

"Is this your first day?" she growled. "Got your regulation suit, your blank stare? Get out of the way." It was a stand off. Bobby didn't like the look on his wife's face. He knew it because he'd worn it. Nothing to lose. She rested a hand on her weapon and he wondered if she was going to kneecap this new recruit.

It didn't come to that. In the end it was a favour (maybe his last) a former buddy in CID who had the ear of the deputy director of the FBI. It took about 35 minutes for permission to trickle down the chain of command and it was the most gut churning 35 minutes they'd ever spent. Wondering what damage a careless boot or a removed piece of 'garbage' might do. Eventually they gained admittance to the scene and Bobby looked around the room it was basic, spare and clean. The carpet was a tight commercial weave but that didn't stop his eagle eye from alighting on something.

"Look." he pointed to divots, four of them equidistant. "Probably from a travel bed of some sort." He exhaled. "Alex, she's taking care of Immy." Further investigation revealed soiled disposable diapers in the bathroom garbage which Alex opened and examined. Out of the corner of her eye she saw him frown.

"There are a world of things stool can tell you" she gave him a look, in a matter of moments she diagnosed her baby's health by using a quick calculation: number of hours checked in divided by number of diapers. Then she tested the weight, a good solid load. Then she manipulated the soft festering consistency of the contents squeezing and turning the heavy white mass of diaper in her hand. Then she exhaled a breath she hadn't even realized she was holding, temporary relief.

There was a grainy whitish powder dusting the night table. Bobby got low and sniffed it, then without hesitation dabbed at it and tasted it. "Formula." he pronounced. All of this wasn't good news exactly but they both felt the sour bitter rising bile recede just a fraction.

"So she wants to kee - keep her." Alex got out painfully rubbing her forehead.

"She wants her in good health. But she won't be keeping her. We'll get her back." he said with authority.

"What else?" Alex asked anxiously she was too wired to see anything beyond Imogen's well being, to do anything beyond her scope as mother. And she pushed him, even though she knew with Bobby it didn't work that way. His process was organic and stemmed from deep contemplation. He wasn't just cataloguing, he was correlating his observations and intuitions with a vast well of knowledge, still she couldn't help herself.

"Let's think about this." He stopped.

"Okay."

"This is Nicole's grandest adventure yet. She's engaged several levels of law enforcement, by design. An explosion in New York?"

"It's like she has a death wish."

"She staged it in the 34th so she secured your participation, just professionally at first, and she knew that a crime of this nature was federal jurisdiction. On it's face it looks like a bomb or terrorism."

Alex nodded.

"Then Immy. She made sure we both had skin in the game. She guaranteed that we would never look away."

"Right she wanted the energy and focus of everyone on her. Narcissistic bitch."

"There's a metaphor there too, if this were a novel think of how an explosion would correlate to k-kidnap-kidnapping a child."

"It's incinerates everything. It shatters you." Alex muttered to the floor, their family had exploded. He nodded slowly.

"She's been in decline. She was at the height of her mental power at Hudson and her financial power with Gavin. But after that it was her disaffected street urchin, then that unattractive, filicidal, former addict. She's come into her own again. She's peacocking. I - I think there's more to her message. We need to focus on the message."

* * *

If she had to listen to this heartless bullshit, watch Satan caress her child, one more time she would snap. But Bobby was listening to it over and over and over. Evaluating tone, timber, tics, twitches and of course her words. Those loaded loathsome words. It was Nicole, he pronounced dispelling any remaining question that they were dealing with a twin. Nicole Bobby said had a small scar to the left of her nose, acne maybe?

The fact that he knew that repulsed Alex and in his defense he said "She got right up in my face so many times. You were there for every single one of them." **_Except that last time, _**he omitted **_"_**I looked into her eyes I saw every inch of her face all the imperfections make up hides."

"Maybe I should keep my distance." she shot back childishly "Cooties."

He snorted at that. "Listen here," he hit play and pulled out the headphone prong so she could hear, "There is a diphthong shift when she says the word 'I' a classic Australian inflection. But a glottal stop before she says my name, a more classically Southern English pronunciation. If you really strain you can even hear the influences from her stint at Lard Yao. It would be hard for a twin to replicate that very specific set of life experiences."

"If you say so." Alex was trying not to be close-minded or thick or vulgar. But she feared that the only way not to in her current state would be to stop contributing altogether. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. And tried to be useful. "What about the words? The phrases. Any literary references, pop culture trivia, ridiculous riddles."

"As a matter of fact…"

"No way."

"Way." he shot back although he wasn't trying to be funny, in fact he'd leaned in so close to the screen of her laptop she expected he'd have to buy it dinner soon.

"What are they?"

"Two off hand. Not sure if she meant anything though."

"She always means something Bobby it makes her feel superior."

He gave a short nod. "Okay. Mommie Dearest. A novel…"

"Even I know that one. Bit low brow for her isn't it? A bio tell all?"

He shrugged "And a quote from Mark Twain. Not from his literary work, it was a quote he gave to a newspaper reporter, apparently, in defense of his vigor after a reporter erroneously wrote he was close to death."

She huffed losing patience. "This isn't like before. Before you asked her a specific question. This is open, infinite possibilities." she let her head drop, demoralized at the prospect of days of speculating, chasing and deciphering. She wanted Imogen now.

"We won't give her what she wants." he said with frightening firmness. "We aren't playing this game."

He had an idea.


	21. Chapter 21

Alex paced in the alley beside the motel, back and forth, back and forth, back and forth like something scary and caged.

"We have to do this," he urged.

"We can't Nicole is too volatile she might get angry and…" she couldn't bear to say it. Instead she looked down at the debris on the ground around her and then kicked a flattened frayed Dunkin Donuts cup and watched it bounce off the cinder block wall.

"She might do something awful if we speak up." he conceded "But even if we don't she might anyway and then we'll have to live with ourselves. We'll always remember how she frightened us into submission."

"You want to play with our daughter's life!"

"I want to try and save her life." he countered, "We can go back up there," he gestured at the second storey of the motel. "Do you want that? Do you want to go back up there and make more empty observations? Do you want to watch her mock us on videotape one more time? Do you want to die a little inside every single second this goes on? Or should we take the fight to her?" He demanded.

Alex just sighed.

Nicole can be reasoned with." he implored "Alex I talked her down after Gwen. But I need to address her directly. I just need you to be on board." he pushed.

She held up 5 splayed, angry fingers to his face. **_Stop talking! Just stop!_** The gesture shouted. She needed to think.

He closed his eyes briefly and couldn't stop a flood of memories,

**_There was a smell of books, the murmur of patrons and his hands clasped on the dark wood veneer of the table. She was there, sitting in front of him, Nicole. She looked at him all wan and pale and sad. At least that was what she wanted to portray. All the indicators of sadness were present, there was reserve in her affect, a flush in her cheeks, a downward slant of her shoulders and mouth. But Bobby couldn't help but think: Her body count is rising, she just killed Larry Chapel. Was she even capable of human emotion? Was this mimicry or genuine? What was actually happening inside her brain? What centres where lighting? What synapses firing? He'd like to stick electrodes to that skull. She was absolutely fascinating._**

**_"You're insane to think that I'd be willing to go back to prison. I have a child to care for." she said there was indignance there._**

**_"You can't possibly think that you can have anything to do with Gwen's life." his voice a harsh whisper, aware of sensitivity of this topic and the sanctity of silence in this place, (his favourite place in the world) a library._**

**_"Yes."_**

**_He spoke over her, "You think about your own child Nicole."_**

**_"That was an accident I, I never meant for her to die, I didn't, I- I loved her."_**

**_"You couldn't stop yourself" his breath was harsh as it broke over her._**

**_"She was just a little girl." she crumbled then, she wept._**

**_"You couldn't control yourself and you can't guarantee that that won't happen again."_**

**_Gw - Gwen is a good girl with a g- good heart. S-she wouldn't, s-she wouldn't love me if there wasn't anything good about me." the tears continued to flow._**

**_"What about your own child wasn't she a good little girl didn't she love you even more then Gwen? One day Gwen will do something, or maybe she'll do nothing, and you will snap." he snapped his fingers for emphasis._**

**_"No, no it won't happen."_**

**_"Yes. you are not safe to be around Nicole. Too much damage has been done." he prayed to get through, to be a powerful drop in her sea of evil, like the butterfly wings that caused a hurricane or the snowflake that started the avalanche anything if she would just hear him._**

**_"With her I'll be healed i- i -it'll be alright."_**

**_"No if you want to save yourself, you have to face up to who you are."_**

Alex snapped him back to reality, with her guffaw. She'd considered his words and his certainty, but then some fiery residual anger flared to the surface. "You just want that old connection again, you and Nicole cozying up across an interrogation table. You just want to play with Satan and make notes."

"Oh come on." He threw his hands and eyes heavenward with disgust.

"No you come on!" She yelled "This is my child. Don't antagonize Nicole." She commanded. And she begged because this was a different Alex, this Alex had _everything_ to lose, her voice lowered to a whisper, "Don't push." She leaned back and crossed her arms allowing the cold anonymous wall to hold her up.

"Alex we're past this, we're past playing it safe. We're coming up on 30 hours. Every second that Imogen is with that… that unstable bi… Every moment it gets more and more dangerous." he moved in front of her. He rubbed her bare arms rhythmically as if trying to circulate the blood, but he didn't know why, it was a hot day. Had anyone passed by, they would have guessed, it was fear and a nervous tickling energy and his rogue body moving and acting but divorced from his mind.

And Alex, she looked so conflicted. The worry - a spasmically trembling lower lip and sagging brow - was a palsy on her features. "We've been trying to do this alone," he said, "We've been so certain we know Nicole best, and we do! But it's a big country and an even bigger world. If she manages to cross the border…"

A yeow of pain escaped Alex because she had a vision Nicole in Mexico or Thailand, giving her baby away or leaving her or or or… Alex dropped to a squat there suddenly, her knees gone, and Bobby got down in the dirt too.

"She is still here, in New York." he slapped a hand to the building, "She was right inside this building 2 hours and 52 minutes ago. She _will hear us_ if we talk. We have to go public Alex."

* * *

But the idea wasn't just to 'go public' Alex found 30 minutes later, the idea was a media bomb. A comprehensive counter-insurgence that barreled into minds and homes of every New Yorker.

"Jack." Alex barked into her cell, it was Jack Leery her detective. "Have we managed to track that video feed from the daycare?" she paused and Bobby listened. "Uh huh, uh huh. I need you to email me that footage immediately."

And he did. That innocuous stuffed elephant sitting on the armoire had quite a story. They had tracked the nanny cam to a company called NewVue, a purveyor and manufacturer wireless video technology. There was an account in their database registered to Melissa Baird. It contained hours (weeks) of archived video. Her login was then tracked to 2 IPs, one an internet cafe in midtown and the other a cellphone that was now off, but had most recently been pinging off a tower 1 mile from their current location in Smithtown.

But the video footage was the game changer.

They watched together again on Alex's laptop in the tight quarters of the SUV. It seemed that Nicole hadn't deleted any of the footage from the website memory. She'd left it there for them, all 5.95 gigabytes worth. And for two devastated parents it was so bittersweet, because it showed their daughter playing and vocalizing and smiling. It showed Tamara her legs moving in and out of frame oblivious to the fact that she was being monitored.

And then came the moment they both longed for (and dreaded), timestamped 07.17.13 at 7:46am. The image trembled as the blast from 183 Corsica Street shook the daycare. The camera, an impartial witness of the awful event, had stayed trained on the babies' cribs. One child had cried, another stood bouncing up and down, yet another had simply sat still.

But these longing parents couldn't pull their eyes away from the wee girl with the ebony hair. Alex had been right. Imogen's head had been down and at the sound of the blast she raised brown eyes up and looked around. Then she sat up and then she started to cry. For mother who wished nothing more in this world then to hold her child it was heart wrenching.

Then an anonymous slender pair of legs in khaki trousers passed across the screen, and then Nicole Wallace in her flaxen beauty, stooped into view and stared boldly into Alex and Bobby's eyes. She smiled like a victor. Then soundlessly stood and dipped into the crib and scooped up their baby, comforting and cooing all the while.

"There, there precious. You have a new mummy now." she told the little girl. They watched in horrified thrall how efficiently she moved. She had Imogen, their collapsed stroller and diaper bag in hand as she left the room. The whole event had taken 58 seconds.

Alex spun away from the screen her breath coming in short puffs.

"You're right" she said to Bobby "We have to go public."

And that was how the Police SUV that she had requisitioned became command central for a new kind of offensive and how one well placed call to Darla in Media Relations at 1PP secured the number of a prime time pitbull, and how Bill Stanstead at the Ledger had gotten an exclusive - all the alleged and not so alleged crimes of Nicole Wallace. A cop dropped off Bobby's file his 2 inch thick memento of Nicole, every transgression, every allegation and every note he'd ever taken. Alex snapped photos of each page and emailed it off, reams and reams of privileged information straight to the inbox of the reporters computer. And this was how the video of the abduction of a defenseless infant was uploaded and instantly went viral on YouTube.

* * *

"This woman is a snake in the grass. Do you hear me America?" Faith Yancy shook her blonde bob with indignation. The screen cut to large as life doe eyed image of Imogen. Bobby had selected this photograph because Immy looked Gerber-worthy. She wore her peach headband and her soft dark curls contrasted her porcelain skin. She was sitting bathed in perfect noonday light, on an expanse of blue cotton blanket. This photo had been taken during their glorious picnic in Prospect Park. It felt like a lifetime ago, he felt a lifetime away from his girl. "Look at this beautiful innocent baby girl." Yancy boomed "How could someone just rip her from her parent's bosom?"

Then the camera came back and fixed on the diva, the show's namesake. "This is a call to arms. Mothers across this nation you mem - o - rize this face," She said a hint of Texan twang in her enunciation. "Memorize it, And when you're out and about I want you to peek inside those strollers and check out who's buying those Pampers. And most importantly if you see this sweet face or the vile monster that took her you call the authorities!" Never was a phrase issued with such righteous outrage.

Then she capped it all with, "Hashtag Bring Immy Home." and that went up magically in white Arial font under her face.

Bobby and Alex sat stock still, dazzled by the lights-camera-action of it all. But this was what it took. This was the right direction and they had a truly worthy story. Their little ravaged family had pre-empted tonight's salacious show called 'Yes, your Elected Officials are Behaving Badly" because Faith Yancy herself thought it made for a better hour of television.

On the screen a montage of photos, of the tiny kidnap victim came up, Imogen squealing, cuddling into her mother, her father, her aunt, her grandpa, her uncles and honorary police officer uncles.

"Please," Bobby looked straight into the camera when he got the cue, his voice quivered ever so slightly. "Immy has been gone for 33 hours." The camera shifted to Alex and a tear carved a slow shiney path down her left cheek. She took a sloppy wet breath and said, "Please." was all she could muster she was so exhausted and terrified and thankful - thankful for Bobby. Alex didn't know what all this would come to, but Bobby had stepped up and stepped in. He had grabbed the limelight and shielded her fragile body.

Then he turned slightly and looked at her and (as planned) she turned her shoulders a fraction to look at him. The camera zoomed in, framing them perfectly He took her hand in his above the table (in view of the lens) and meshed their hands in solidarity. Then raised that ball of fingers and pressed his lips to it warm and moist and lingering. It was a magnificent display. It was the truth and his game all rolled into one. It told a story about how he loved Alex, how he would never let her go and yet it was designed to make Nicole to recoil, at both their public unity and startling intimacy.

**_We are not broken. _**That message was clear.

"Is there something you want to say to this monster?" Yancy cajoled, ever agitating, like a tag on the collar of a t-shirt.

"Nicole this isn't the way. If you are angry at me come for me." _**Taunting a serial killer, that's one way to go Goren,**_ he thought as he said the words. "I watched the videos, I know what you are trying to say to me. I know you want someone to love, to be close to, but this is not the way." He implored "Look into our daughter's eyes. She was made from our love. She is the most innocent, the most dependent person you will ever encounter. She needs you Nicole. She needs you to be kind and decent. She needs you to find your goodness. You were right Nicole, Gwen wouldn't have loved you if you didn't have a soul."

"Please just bring her home or leave her somewhere safe and we will come and get her. Please. I - I love my daughter, we miss her, we need her." Alex found her voice.

And Faith Yancy in her hot pink blazer nodded vigorously. Her head bobbing in that boldly affirmative way that played so well on screen. "We're all looking and praying aren't we America?"


	22. Chapter 22

That night they returned to 'Alex's' hotel room together. And once the door was closed and locked it shrank the size of a closet. Both of them unable to settle, both of them filling the corners and table tops and the every molecule of oxygen with unspoken thoughts and emotions and frustration.

After the media maelstrom this place was both surreal and ordinary. They were professionally powdered and fluffed for their television debut on the outside and crying on the inside. And this room, this room with no association for either of them wasn't pleasantly anonymous, it was toxic. So they marinated in misery together in this strange 4th floor cupboard. Hotels were for vacations or business, this was purgatory, merely a place to be in between, in between heaven and hell, dusk and dawn, conscious and un, between childless and reunited.

That last part was optimistic. And they both knew it.

Eventually they did lie down on the bed beside each other, kind of clothed, bits of garb shed, her jeans here, his shirt there - but not talking, only lying on their backs staring into blackness. The darkness had a quality all it's own heavy, thick, suffocating like old motor oil. The filthy, obsidian stuff seeped into the quality of their thoughts.

"Do you think Nicole will do it quickly?" Alex asked after at least an hour of silence.

"What?"

"Kill her."

"Oh God."

"So she won't suffer."

"I can't…" his hands had flown to his face, his voice was muffled.

"Please. Tell me she won't suffer." she begged congested and hoarse, "Please." And Bobby knew then she wasn't talking to him. "Please." she pled again.

He rolled hurling his body toward the lamp, smashing the side of his head right into the edge of the night table as he did. The light was shocking and the bed was empty. Then he saw the top of her head over the edge. She was there on her knees slumped back against the mattress. Maybe she'd fallen, maybe she'd moved there on purpose, but when he got around he realized she was bleeding and her lamp was broken. She was holding a sharpened piece of it, not menacingly or self destructively, just as though she might have been meaning to clean up and gotten distracted. She had sliced into her left palm.

He wondered where he had been when all this happened. In a trance? In a dead sleep?

"Alex." he picked her up by the shoulders but her legs, they wouldn't straighten, they wouldn't bear her body at all, they bowed and trailed behind her. He gave her a small shake. Was she sleeping? It was possible. They were both exhausted.

"Alex?"

He swung her up into his arms and carried her to the bathroom. She was broken. This rotten rancid situation had broken his beautiful wife. He set her down on the vanity and she immediately listed to one side. He fumbled to keep her from falling.

"Alex." He cupped her face trying to get her to focus. **_Oh... oh God has she taken something?_** "Alex!" Now, there it was, in his stomach, the cold crampy expanding panic. He wet his hand with icy water and rubbed it all over her face and neck. She let her head fall back and looked up at him. She was in agony but lucid, a crimson massacre running down her hand and smeared across one pale thigh.

"You're okay." he whispered mostly to himself "You're okay."

Her breath was shaky her face wet and sallow. "I'm a mess."

Every single one of his muscles released at the familiarity of her tone, he almost wet himself with relief. "You and me both." he pressed his forehead to hers and steadied her. "Stay here. Can you?" She nodded and he left her, he was back almost the instant he'd gone with his tie, his favourite, aubergine and taupe. Today it was wrinkled as though it had been jammed somewhere. And then he rinsed her wound and used it as a tourniquet holding her hand with reverence and knotting the tie like old dish rags.

Alex watched those big hands administer to her and then looked briefly down at the front of her shirt. She tugged it out from her frame. Two large sopping circles had made the white fabric transparent right over her breasts. Her milk, her abundant unsuckled milk. She gasped for breath at the thought.

But he wouldn't let her snake back to the bad place. "It's a sign sweetheart." he tried to smile. "It's a sign that she's coming home."

"Do you think so Bobby?" she sniffled _needing_ to believe.

"I know so." He got out firmly, although he knew nothing of the sort. He gathered her toward him and scooped her up like a child and she wrapped arms and legs around him. "Liz left your pump. Let's keep your supply up." It was either the best or the cruelest thing he had ever said to her.

And he thought then, if he was wrong they wouldn't come back from this.

They wouldn't make it.


	23. Chapter 23

The cult of personality.

The cult of curiosity.

This was not the way that anyone should become a celebrity, but Bobby and Alex had made themselves a commodity. And now that they sold newspapers and spiked ratings they belonged to the people. This was what they had wanted, wasn't it? They had wanted the planet to turn it's collective head and look at them, because they had felt so alone and victimized and so demoralized. They had asked for this 'help'. But they had forgotten how resourceful the press could be. Staying in a three star hotel, in Inwood, under your real name wasn't exactly hiding. Finding them was 10 minutes work for a newbie reporter.

And so it transpired that by rote they got up and got dressed, showering and brushing with toiletries and clothing that had magically appeared in their room (courtesy of some good samaritan who knew they would go unchanged and unwashed without help). Both were silently steeling themselves for another day without their child and they were quite the worse for wear after a brutally draining night. They left the aging hotel (quite innocently) through double glass doors that morning and they stepped out onto a New York sidewalk and straight into a faceful of cameras and questions and flash bulbs and ridiculously long lenses.

Alex wondered if it was wrong to ask for help one day and the very next tell everybody to just FUCK OFF! She felt as though that one evening had aged her 10 years. Her mouth was so dry and her hands and her face, her very soul felt like crepe paper so rough and fragile. They jumped and jockeyed and jostled and she had never felt so exposed. Alex Goren née Eames, wasn't even sure she could talk.

_Blind sided_.

She lowered her eyes and took a deep breath praying for strength.

How could she not have known it would be like this.

Up and down the street she counted 7 large logo'd media vans and exponentially higher number of journalists flowing from inside them, from between the cracks of them. It felt like they were everywhere. It was so funny, given their past. She and Bobby (of all people) should have known. They had been here so many times before (as the objective authorities of course, not the bereaved and terrified parents) during the Amberleigh Harner case, the Bethany Lunden circus, the Emma Haslum 'abduction'. The press had been relentless. Alex remembered back then the wild speculation and the almost offensively incorrect conclusions. The parents (innocent or guilty - it didn't matter) had been sitting squarely in the sites.

But on the other hand, even dazzled by flashbulbs and set upon like prey, Alex could admit their story was absolute gold. It had love, hatred, loss, a vendetta, murder, mayhem, law and order. And of course at it's heart a precious innocent. A tiny person turned rallying point, her Imogen. It was perfect. They were a copy editors wet dream.

_"Captain Goren! Captain Goren! aren't you worried that calling out the kidnapper will end badly?"_

**_No shit Sherlock_** she thought but said nothing. _**Worried? Worried?!** _She hadn't eaten in 15 hours, she hadn't slept more then 5 hours for all the worry. They both ignored that absurdity.

_"Do you realize that you have 1 million hits on Youtube?"_

"Thank God!" Bobby did say that aloud.

_"What is the status of the case? Have there been any viable leads since your appearance on the Faith Yancy show?"_

**_It's 6 o'clock in the morning asshole, here's a lead: my body aches from crying all night._** Alex didn't know how they could expect anything from them 9 hours later. Suddenly she felt dizzy and sick deep in the hollow of her stomach. She reached out just a little and as if he read her mind in that instant Bobby tucked her against him.

"Space please," he barked swinging his arm low to eke out the barest separation between them and the frenzy.

_"Is there any truth to the rumours that you were once intimate with Nicole Wallace?"_

**_Oh shit._ **He didn't want to reopen that with Alex or taint public perception. "No truth whatsoever."

_"Is there anything else you want to say to the abductor?"_

**_Can I have a coffee before I bumble into some poorly thought out statement that gets my daughter killed._** Alex thought. But then she felt Bobby square himself up and tighten his hold on her. He looked dead into the camera and said,

"Nicole. The world knows your face. And I know your mind. Return Imogen today and I will help you. This is not a trick I really want to help you. Please let me."

_**Not what I would have chosen** _Alex thought, she had been thinking something along the line of _**die you venomous bitch**_. But she and Bobby had agreed that they couldn't take a hard line, they had to be firm but also make her feel... Understood.

In that instant, for the first time in ages, Alex longed for the old days. Before any of it, even before the fruit of her womb, her baby. She remembered the bliss of ignorance before her exposure to world of such personal decimation. She remembered the simplicity of 1PP when their roles and platonic relationship had let them become the best, the absolute best cops in New York City. If they'd been lead detectives on this case they would have shouldered through this crowd and engaged in an elaborate dance of evasion and manipulation. But they were parents, and in that chaotic moment everything they'd learned, every skill they'd honed in their respective 20 plus year careers, flew out of their heads and up into the ether like motes of dust.

"That's it everybody, that's all." Bobby slipped his arm protectively around her shoulders and they moved? pushed? heads down to the welcome waiting SUV.

* * *

A calm fell over the precinct when they walked in. The only sound the whir of computer fans or the odd creak of a city chair under the weight of clenched buttocks. Everyone was on edge.

"As you were!" Alex broke the silence and moved nimbly between the desks and other obstacles to get to the sanctuary of her office.

_So many eyes,_ suddenly the world felt like it was just millions of eyes.

"Reeve, Leery!" she bellowed clutching the door frame "My office!" And she wondered if she would lose her job over this, if it went on, because right now there was only one case, all other crime in the city be damned. Maybe it was time to select an auxiliary. Someone to help her. The two men came in and plopped down across from her desk while Bobby haunted the back of the room.

"The results of the dragnet were disappointing." Detective Reeve started. "The feds stopped almost a 800 vehicles in a 10 mile radius of the Seabreeze Motel, and nothing. She was probably smart and holed up after getting out. She's pretty much invisible if she isn't moving."

"What about the trap and trace?"

"No peculiar calls or activity to your home phone." Leery said on a deep troubled sigh, "But the techs did a sweep for listening devices and more cameras and they found one."

Alex felt her blood run cold.

"Where?" Bobby demanded.

"Inside a hollowed out book on the shelf in the livingroom."

"Which one?" Bobby demanded again.

Both detectives turned and looked at him then each other, it wasn't the question they had expected. Bobby knew what they thought, they thought that he was losing it, going crazy getting lost in minutiae, but he knew Nicole and nothing was a coincidence.

"That we don't know." Reeve said slowly "But we can find out."

"Good. It matters." Bobby stared him down unblinking.

The detective looked at his Captain, then back at the big man, then at his cap again, with the heat of Bobby's gaze still on the back of his neck.

"Now would be good time to do that." Alex issued the order, because her husband couldn't. She had read his mind. "A page number too if she left any part in tact."

"Ah oh - Okay." Reeve got up and left.

Jack Leery continued without his partner, though the energy in this room was a little scary. He felt like he was accidentally intercepting some electromagnetic waves, something strong was running between these two. "I - I think it was a good move to engage the public" he said. "Fear is the reason things go wrong. It was brave." he seemed uncomfortable with the delivering accolades and even more aware that it might still all end badly, but he squeezed the words past gruff cop lips. "We'll start to see a pattern now with more people looking, and there's this phenomenon going on…"

They looked at him quizzically.

"The moms groups are taking Yancy to heart and rallying membership. They have the city, more like the eastern seaboard, split into districts and thousands are checking in on Twitter.

Those were the first words that buoyed them. **_Please! Please._** Both of the haggard weary parents prayed.

* * *

And like so many of these things, there was no fire fight, no swinging from suspension bridges, no dropping a ransom in unmarked bills inside a rusting city garbage can, there was only waiting and monitoring and hoping.

And it was horrible.

Alex tried to show interest in her guys (and gals) wandering the squad room engaging them on whatever they were doing. But it was the most half-hearted attempt at doing a job ever. She rounded the corner and into the kitchen to regain herself. And it was there beside the squad room coffee machine that Alex found 'her' copy of the article, the one that they had given the Ledger. She picked up a newspaper from the carelessly piled hanks of grey. There were some embarrassingly intimate front page photos on both this paper and the Daily News, but this was the beast she and Bobby had released.

**"Love in Ruins"** one proclaimed the other **"Holding On"**. What was it with headlines and puns? She guessed that all the word games were an attempt to add depth to banal motivations, to justify their intrusion for gain. Even though she and Bobby had courted the press, Alex still viewed it as a private moment stolen for profit.

Besides, both of the papers had pictures of them had been taken at the beginning of this mess before consent. They were stark black and white style depictions with the destroyed building in the backdrop and them in the foreground in a grief stricken clench against the side of a police car. Alex hadn't even seen the photog in the moment, her fight with Bobby and subsequent surrender had been so completely consuming. But looking at the image it was their whole story summed up in ink.

In the first grainy still, her face was wet and miserable. True devastation in every muscle and Bobby's hands were at her waist, his body an S curve over her. She preferred the second picture though, the still life on the cover of the Daily News because looking at it, even through a haze of pain, it captured how she felt about her husband and undeniably how he felt about her. She had been so angry, about Nicole and his deception. She still was. But holding the newsprint lessened it a bit. She looked at herself sagging against him and he was cupping both sides of her face in profile. His brow was furrowed in distress and his lips were pressed to her forehead. Her eyes were closed. Somehow the image was a play on perspective the shell of the building looming. I was a quiet moment of pain and yet the city moved on around them.

She dropped the paper onto her desk with a slap "I feel impressed and violated." she told Bobby speaking in her new low slow way, sinking into her seat and rubbing her troubled brow.

"All I can think of is how many more people will be looking for Immy." Their whole story was there filling pages and pages. All the information they'd sent in about Nicole, but so much more. It made their relationship and accomplishments and her predisposition toward law enforcement seem dynastic.

And there was Nicole, finally a cover story. Even while on trial at best she'd been relegated to page 10 or 15 with a tiny inset mug shot. Now she was front page news, her face on the lower left and her exploits (always prefaced by the word allegedly of course) spelled out in all their chronological glory. A graph of victims and conquests from shores of Australia until today. It tracked through the veins moving from organ to organ illustrating just how far her disease had spread.

Now everybody knew.

* * *

"Cap?" she looked up to see Peter Reeve swing in on a door frame. "That book, it was an…" he pulled out his leather bound notepad. "it was an an - anthology." the word sounded foreign and awkward on his tongue "called 'A Collection of American Short Stories.' She hollowed out a good section but the only story missing was called 'A Double Barrelled Detective Story'" He flipped to the next page "author Mark Twain."

"Okay thanks." Alex looked expectantly at Bobby. He sank heavily into the chair adjacent her. It was his book, an old favourite. Well of course it was his book. Nicole was too smart to try and slip a new text into his collection, he loved his books, he babied those books.

"Nicole you bitch." he shook his head in exasperation. "She's mocking me."

Alex raised her brows.

"It's a short story in two parts. It's about revenge and sleuthing. In part one a woman abused by her husband bears a child, she raises him to avenge her. Not by killing just by tormenting her abuser, his father. He tracks his abuser all over the world. In the second part there's an explosion. Sherlock Holmes arrives to solve the mystery. Only in this case Holmes is a bumbling blowhard whose insights have no real currency." He quoted something Nicole had once said to him over a plate of wilting salad. "The culprit all along was Holmes' nephew, a weak feckless boy. And the man from part 1, the one avenging his mother, is there and shows the 'great' Detective up by solving the mystery.

"My head hurts." Alex winced "Does any of this matter. Or is she distracting us again?"

"I'll need to consider it." he mulled

More time, more energy, more empty contemplation, while in her minds eye Nicole edged ever closer to the border. Alex couldn't believe she was sitting here sipping coffee and discussing Mark Twain by Wallace's design. She should be out in the field, she should be the hero. What an awful way to learn you were ordinary. _They_ were ordinary. She had no words. Her eyes just lost a little more of their light.

"She's trying to tell me that I'm ineffective and foolish." Bobby murmured unable to _not_ love a puzzle, even now. "Clearly I'm Holmes. No doubt she's cast herself as the smart avenger."

But Alex was always one to focus on the who. "She is making asses of us. She is destroying us." Alex said thinking about all the living they had done in that room it had been her favourite room in the house. She thought about all the intimacy and laughter and tears that Nicole had watched through a cleverly placed lens. Then with calm cool certainty Alex took a sip of tepid dying coffee and said, "She can't live. This is only over when I put a bullet between her eyes."

He nodded.


	24. Chapter 24

**A/N: Sorry everyone I was away on another chaotic vacation: a small Caribbean island, with 2 young kids, bank cards that wouldn't work, dodgy wifi… I couldn't string two coherent thoughts together. But now let the story continue.**

* * *

And this is how the tide turned.

One day, 48 hours and 23 minutes after the most horrific moment of either of their lives, Detective Reeve came screeching into her office.

"Get to Connecticut! Get to Connecticut!"

And they were out of their chairs before the last syllable, moving quickly through the precinct. The detective briefed them breathlessly as they walked, "A store clerk in a CVS in Mystic, Connecticut stopped Wallace. A customer, a woman, recognized her and alerted the cashier. He tried to stop her and got a fist to the throat for his trouble. So no doubt it was her." he huffed and puffed a little as they skirted desks and cops. "This shopper, the one that pegged her, had an eagle eye because she said Wallace was a brunette not a blonde and..."

"Immy" Alex gasped, an unbidden utterance straight from her soul.

"And your daughter wasn't with her." He broke the news and broke them, but he quickly gathered up the pieces. "But she ran and someone got plates and someone else gave chase so," he puffed jogging down the stairs with them, "the police think they have separated her from the child. They got an APB out immediately."

Alex listened to him and she heard his words of optimism. But she was terrified and a pessimistic script played over and over in her head: **_She's dead, she's dead, she's dead, she's dead_ **and maybe it passed her lips because suddenly everyone was looking at her.

"She was buying a zinc oxide ointment." The detective shook his head, "I think it's safe to assume it was for a child, maybe one with a rash from dietary changes or stress." Alex would have smiled if she had the ability, the younger detective was thinking like them - intuitively, broadly. He was a good. Reeve might have a future at Major Case someday.

Bobby gave him a manly double pat on the back before they sprinted to the SUV.

Reeve watched them haul out of the precinct parking lot. He hoped this would end today.

* * *

"Dammit," Alex slammed the heel of her palm against the steering wheel. "We're all the way here and she's all the way there." the distance between Inwood and Mystic was a daunting chasm.

"Don't. Don't!" he repeated firmly. "Let's just get moving." It was all they could do.

She set the GPS for Connecticut and let out a sob she couldn't control. It said 2 hours and 11 minutes and that was traffic permitting.

**_Why! Why! Why! had they come back to the city?_**

**_You know why_**, a voice pushed. They'd come for Faith Yancy and for her studios in midtown. And this very lead, the one they were heading toward was a result of that appearance. But logic was not strong in Alexandra today, angst, grief and fear were ahead by a mile. And because she was both so desperate and so thwarted her mind went on the same kind of non-linear journey the SUV was, as she weaved in and out of the painfully slow New York gridlock.

**_Fuck you Nicole! Poor baby a diaper rash and a hostage. Mystic, Connecticut? Mystic Pizza? I want to rear end this idiot._** And so on and so on and so on.

Even slapping on the sirens couldn't bust through the congestion. Alex gripped the wheel and felt her face heat. She was just one more honk away from tears. And just then as if by magic (as good fortune always seems) her cell phone rang. And he picked it up to allow her to concentrate.

"This is her husband." Bobby said and, for the gruffness of tone, may well have said **_I don't have time for this_**. And then his brow lightened and his entire disposition shifted and Alex heard him almost joyfully say "Yes, yes, yes we would."

"What!" Alex all but screamed skating on a razors edge.

"The producer from the Faith Yancy show wanted to know if we'd heard about the developments and if we need a lift to Mystic… In the network chopper."

And Alex laughed, actually laughed.

"West 30th Street Heli-port." he told her programming in a new destination.

13 minutes.

A sweet turn of fortune.

* * *

She had never flown in a helicopter before. He had in his army days. But it was new all over again, the ear splitting turn of the blades and the great big noise reducing headphones. They couldn't help but look down on the world and imagine what might await them below. But this wasn't a free ride. Faith Yancy - with her straw blond hair and hawkish glare - was sitting primly, ankles crossed, in a steel blue pant suit, in front of them. Before boarding they'd had to sign several documents of a bland legal nature: health and safety, liability waivers, exclusivity to Global Network. The Yancy machine used the law to bind them, to force them to surrender their sorrow and joy for a niche TV audience. The ink on the contract was red and to Bobby it felt like it'd been tapped from a vein.

They got there in 35 minutes. And then there was another 10 to drive in from the helipad. The cushioned leather seats of the network limousine felt like they cost a chunk of soul. The producer opened a refrigerated cabinet and offered them a beverage. Inside on 3 shelves were an array of small bottles with shiny colourful labels clinking happily with each bounce of the wheels.

Alex gritted her teeth "This isn't a party." She snapped because she didn't want to be here, because this was business and anyway it was impossible to offend Lucifer. Bobby rested a hand on her thigh and rubbed long and even, back and forth. She watched and felt the movement and then unwound - just a fraction.

"We can't." He said tightly waving off even water. If the words could barely come up nothing was going down.

A familiar scene of unchecked media avarice awaited them at the CVS in Mystic. But not just, it was also teeming with law enforcement and spectators. They marched right up to the cops and Alex pulled her badge. A parent would have gotten the blue wall of silence but for a fellow officer the story flowed without hesitation. As it turned out Nicole had managed to get to the tip of Long island. She had caught the ferry and crossed the sound and arrived in New London, Connecticut. Alex was familiar with that part of Long Island. It was picturesque and dotted with small communities. Near the port, off on the horizon were the houses of the affluent, all real wood siding and cedar shake exteriors.

Taking that route had been quite a risky maneuver for Nicole considering the thinning of the communities on the north eastern tip of the island. Had she stopped she would have stood out as a stranger. And of course she'd sat in tight quarters for over an hour on the ferry most likely with Imogen. That gamble either spoke of desperation or hubris, probably both knowing Nicole. And of course knowing all this now they understood why she'd had to change her identity. Neither Bobby nor Alex had ever felt such serenity at someone else's discomfort, cheering her worry, relishing her fear and knowing she was constantly looking over her shoulder lifted them. Surely if she hadn't hurt Imogen by now she didn't intend to.

"They took the clerk to the hospital." Deputy Falwell informed them, flicking a hand at the pharmacy.

"He okay?" Alex got out.

"He will be. The customers called 911 and response time was strong."

"She punched him in the throat?" Bobby asked skeptically.

"Actually eyewitness accounts say he grabbed her arm as she was try to leave, and she twisted away and jammed her forearm into his…" he gestured up and down along the length of his neck.

"Trachea." Bobby supplied, he knew it, it was a classic self defence move they taught cadets and new recruits it was called the throat strike. It brought down big game, sometimes permanently. Nicole was playing for keeps. Normally she had no truck with hand to hand. It was good to see her deviating from her MO of exotic poisons. She was definitely stressed.

"She dropped her purchase." the deputy held up an evidence bag. "We have prints. It's her."

Alex took it. It was indeed diaper rash cream, in fact, her inner eye moved through her daughter's nursery and pulled open the top drawer of her white dresser with the hand applied pink polka dots, inside was a caddy and tucked between the talcum powder and the baby oil was the very same brand. "I use this." she murmured and handed it back. Every move Nicole made was a violation of her innocence, a message: **_I know what you buy, I know your secrets._**

"You brought 'em?" the deputy asked tossing a disdainful thumb at the Yancy machine as it setup for filming front and centre attracting the ire of all the other journalists. Faith was in a directors chair wearing a paper bib being dusted and primped.

"No they brought us." Bobby's voice was clipped.

"Well." The deputy said slowly "It's going to be attempted murder here. She damn near asphyxiated that boy."

He let them onto the scene. They met Deborah Smythe, the woman that had recognized Nicole. She was a young mother herself. Alex wasn't one for public displays of emotion, but she embraced this woman who had cared enough to look, cared enough to sound the alarm. Alex was seeing that for every person that ground you down or broke your heart, there were ten willing to lift you up and help you out.

"Did Nicole say anything?" Bobby asked her looking down, his hands clasped behind his back, he was over a foot taller then both his wife and the good samaritan.

"Well." the woman looked up thoughtfully, "She said, 'Can I help you?' because I was staring and then I said 'No.' Then I circled around through the deodorant aisle to tell Tom my suspicions."

That was what Bobby had wanted to hear. He broke away from the women and walked slowly up the baby care aisle, wondering what Nicole had left once she realized she'd been made. He found it tucked between the creams. A folded piece of paper.

"What is it?" Alex was there in an instant. He'd followed the scent and she followed him.

"A page from my book. Twain again." he shook his head in frustration.

Alex pinched the bridge of her nose. "This is all a game to her."

"It's the world cup." He tucked the square of paper into his pocket (which was unethical) but breaking the chain of evidence was the least of his concerns right now.

* * *

"Why does she keep tracking up and down the state." Alex spoke nervously as they moved out of the store. "Why didn't she leave right away? Get far off and…" Her voice caught "And never come back."

"Us."

"What do you mean?"

"She wanted to revel in our distress. Play her games and see the fall out first hand. It would be harder to do that from anywhere else." they climbed into the empty limo to talk privately. "She's having fun." Bobby reached up and gripped the roll bar above his head so tightly it fired all of the blood from his hand.

And that was when his cell phone chimed. This was their second stroke of good fortune (though not at first). Both of them jumped because in the confines of the limo it sounded like a canon. He scanned the display not recognizing the number. But in retrospect _he should have known_.

"Hello Bobby. Do you really want to help me?" she asked sassily. So she was watching the news, just as he suspected.

"Nicole!" He thundered "Dammit Nicole give me back my child right now or this conversation is over. My help is conditional."

"Well played by the way," She delivered rancid accolades "turning everyone on me."

"You deserved it. Imogen where is she?"

"I will tell you where she is."

"Now." He felt red blinding fury rising, at this horrible, vicious excuse for a human being.

"Hold on daddy."

"Nicole!" he raged "Stop the games!"

"Meet me then. If you meet me we'll give her the address of your little girl."

_**Her? Alex? She was depersonalizing Alex. **_He felt a shiver attack him.

"This has all the earmarks of a double cross." he growled "You always were adept at divide and conquer."

"I'm feeling a little pressured these days."

"Who's fault is that. You set the rules of this game. I want my child."

"I expected this. I expected you wouldn't come to me. What does she have that I don't?"

**_Alex? Again? Was this whole thing just some play for his affections._** "Tell me where Imogen is!" he yelled, finally losing it after days of stress and tension and fear. "You crazy bitch. Tell me where my daughter is!"

"I already have. She's fine but I wouldn't leave her alone too long. What if something happened? How would you live with yourself?" the disembodied accent taunted and the line went dead.

"Well…" Alex begged

"She's left her." The fight immediately drained out of him.

"What?"

"Nicole has left her somewhere alone." his voice broke "And she wants me to puzzle it out."

"Oh my God" It was said on a moan. Alex couldn't catch her breath, she felt like she was choking, she was Nicole's second victim today. And in that private moment of sheer panic the door to the limo flew open and harsh sunlight poured in around the silhouette of the producer. It couldn't have come at a worse time.

"We've been looking all…"

"Leave us alone!" Alex screeched, then she turned to Bobby and cupped his cheeks in both hands and breathlessly expelled "We need to think. We need to think. She can't be alone. Please we need to think." her hands were trembling and he could see the terror in the whites of her eyes and feel it vibrating through his jaw.

He slapped large calming hands over her small ones. "It's okay. Alex it's okay. It's a puzzle, we can do a puzzle. Right?" he nodded reassuringly because she was spiralling away again.

"Yes. You're right, yes." the affirmation was a little mindless and detached but it was there.

"Good, good." he pulled her in close and buried his face in her neck for just a moment. It was hard for him, hard being certain and strong. Alex was the rock and _he_ was the basketcase. He brought complimentary set of qualifications to their union but she was the tether. Right now he just wanted to be sandwiched in her warmth. It was a very childlike impulse that he couldn't stop it. He wanted to live in the space between shoulder and neck, he wanted to smell the familiar blend of fust and fruit that made her Alex, he wanted to bathe in her unconditional love. Bobby didn't know when her love had become so integral to his survival, but like a sleeper by the time he'd detected it's presence it was in deep and it already had all his secrets. He and Alex had scarcely left each other during this whole mess and yet he felt so horribly alone.

She didn't disappoint. Even despondent and scared she plunged fingers into his short curls massaging his scalp the way she used to on lazy evenings on the couch when his head was cradled in her lap. And Bobby was transported. So much so that he gathered her sweet weight toward him until she was perched on his knees. It wasn't conscious. It was his limbs acting of their own accord, reliving their own cherished memories. And just like before (like that stolen moment in the diner restroom) solace was achieved and spirits rallied.

Unlike that time however a camera crew was filming them.

Alex was livid, she almost hurled one of those upscale beverages at the lens. She almost hurled every kind of profanity. But wouldn't that just be the sensational angle they wanted: **_Worried Mom Snaps! _**or**_ She's lost it! _**With an accompanying picture of her distorted face and flailing hands. So instead she accepted that the moment was ruined. She slid sadly from the comfort of his lap and then slid a hand into the pocket of his suit jacket. She removed the little encryption. She handed it to him and he unfolded it and analysed it, every detail.

"It's the the same tale by Twain. It's a short passage, about a missing child."

"Do they find her alive?"

"Yes under the wing of a kindly Native American. They manage to track the child because the detective has a keen sense of smell like a bloodhound."

"Are there directions?" Alex asked anxiously. She was starting to see why Nicole had chosen this story the elements were spot on, even if the plot differed.

"I'll read you the passage. This is the trail he follows to find the child" Bobby took the sheet and began. "'He strode off swiftly southward, the files following, swaying and bending in and out with the deep curves of the gorge. Thus a mile, and the mouth of the gorge was reached; before them stretched the sagebrush plain, dim, vast, and vague. Stillman called a halt, saying, "We mustn't start wrong, now; we must take the direction again."'"

"'He took a lantern and examined the ground for a matter of twenty yards; then said, "Come on; it's all right," and gave up the lantern. In and out among the sage-bushes he marched, a quarter of a mile, bearing gradually to the right; then took a new direction and made another great semicircle; then changed again and moved due west nearly half a mile—and stopped.'

They stared at each other. It was gobbledygook. It was vague and filled with literary licence. Alex felt panic swelling again.

But he was all business. "We need a map. We need to figure out local terrain. We need a search party."

Now Alex turned on the Yancy machine, her eyes lit by the fire of idea. "And we need you."


	25. Chapter 25

Bobby had acquired three (old school) paper maps, a tub of push pins and a cork board and he sequestered himself in an office inside the Mystic, Connecticut police department. He was sticking those pins in at a frantic rate based on Twain's descriptions. It felt exhilarating, it felt horrifying. This was the part of the job he missed and yet this was a situation he loathed. He looked at the topographical renderings of upper Manhattan, south western Connecticut (where he currently stood) and the area in and around his own home in Brooklyn.

He needed to quickly decide where to apply their efforts, he needed to read Nicole's mind and decipher her code. Just because she'd lead them on a merry chase all over Long Island and beyond, didn't mean it was relevant to her plans. She was sadistic. She couldn't be counted on to use conventional logic. Would she really tie all this chaos to an author (Twain) and his century old words? Or was it just a rouse? Or maybe a bit of both. Maybe she used the book to establish the parameters but decided to go home to roost. New York City was a much more personally significant location to all of them.

He had 45 minutes to figure it all out.

An arbitrary deadline but a firm one.

Immy didn't have long.

They had to find their baby before nightfall and contrary to popular belief galvanizing a search was no simple feat. Searchers needed to be found and vetted and of course told where to search and what techniques to use. And most significant of all, Alex, she was counting on him.

Bobby was terrified that he might be wrong. And with the stakes so high he was constantly distracted by trivialities: the cool air vent blowing on the back of his neck, the tick tick tick of the clock above his head, the way the door shuddered against the frame with every gust of air. He looked at the huge swaths of terrain on the maps and felt the sting of bile, sour and bitter rise up in his throat. He had a stabbing pain in his abdomen that he'd been coping with for a day and it'd only occurred 5 minutes ago that it might be hunger. Right now he was less man and more a ball of disarray. He looked harriedly over his shoulder for her and frowned. Alex had just been here hadn't she? When had she left? Had a door opened? Had one shut? He was losing his mind. A third had gone the way of Frances, a third to Brady, he always fancied the last third to be his own, a rational, sane, calm compartment - but no longer. This was what descent into madness really felt like, your awareness of self and scope slowly eroding.

**_Focus Goren._**

**_Focus._**

He raised a large paw and struck himself hard across the cheek.

And at that moment she breezed in. Alex. She was so much lighter on her feet, so much _cleaner_ then he was that he imagined her breezing. And she was carrying two giant coffees along with the levity he needed.

"Don't you hit my husband." she quipped. It was the closest she'd been to Alex in so long.

"He needs a stick not a carrot." Bobby shot back almost playfully.

"Oh I don't know about that." she slipped an extra-large paper cup into his hand, it was white and logoed - the good stuff - because she knew he needed a real kick not that watery squad room crap. And she accompanied the caffeine gift with love, stroking his back right between the shoulder blades.

Alex had gone to the ladies room splashed some water on her face and given herself a version of 'the 34th pep talk.' That was, the talk that had gotten her through her roughest days as a fledgeling captain. If she wanted 1PP results from Bobby he needed her to reprise their 1PP roles - and then some. She couldn't turn into a sloppy wet rag at the mention of anything disturbing. By her logic, if Bobby was busy being her, there was no room from him to be him. So she was trying, with superhuman effort to give him what he needed. Presently she was sizing up his three region search area.

"Mystic, Prospect Park and Inwood." He spoke to Alex, perching on the tables edge beside her, pushing back the open library books and a loaner laptop with his butt. He sipped his coffee and fought to keep sharp under her soothing touch. "The place Nicole fled, the place most important to our family and the place Immy was taken."

She nodded slowly.

"Have we gotten footage from the ferry yet?" He wanted to know once and for all if this cross sound adventure was a decoy, or if Nicole had actually had their child with her on the journey.

"No. So much red tape with the port authority." Alex sighed.

"All this could be moot." He couldn't hide his frustration.

"I know, I know." she leaned against him ever so slightly resting her temple on his bicep. "Forget about it. All of it. All of the noise. All of the what ifs." Her voice was calm and her hand still soothed him. Then she wheedled a little, she angled a little because in the end they both knew it was going to be a gamble, an educated guess. "Baby, what do your instincts tell you?"

**_She hadn't called him that in an eternity._**

Funny, but the diminutive made him feel competent, confident, masculine.

It made him remember sweeter times.

And suddenly he knew.

"Home. Prospect Park. The sage is in bloom."

* * *

They got a little push back from the PD in Mystic when they explained that they were upping stakes and heading back home.

"It's foolhardy." The chief chastised. "Wallace came all the way out here, she was buying provisions for the child. If you leave you may be leaving your daughter here. How will you live with yourself?"

It was the second time Bobby had been asked that question in an hour. And honestly he knew how. If he was wrong he wouldn't be living anymore. He felt resigned to that fact but he kept it to himself rather than burden the party with his borderline suicidal musings. If he failed at this task, the weight of his inaccurate conclusions would be too much for him to bear going forward. Alex would be devastated. They would be ripped from each other by grief. It would all be compounded by the knowledge that his deceit had started this and then his empty fumbling attempts at detecting had ended it. It would be over for him.

"Nobody knows Wallace like we do. That's why she's been leading us around by the nose. She's paying us back, giving us a taste of every intersection we've ever had with her. She's compounding every ounce of pain we've ever inflicted on her. She will definitely end this where it started and leave us with some unshakable memories right outside our front door." All that from Alex.

Bobby looked at her in awe. She understood him in a way that was both startling and frightening. Her support was unwavering and her logic was his logic in duplicate. In that instant something warm and bright rose up in him and beat back the darkness.

And then he watched Alex get on her phone and begin barking orders to Reeve and Leery and through them the FBI. She would have galvanized the whole fucking state if she'd had the power and sent them all to Prospect Park. Then she got on her laptop and she tweeted out the last firm location of Nicole Wallace and thanked (as effusively as one could in 140 characters) the dedication and help the public had provided. Then she stood in front of the baying, calling pack of press and did it all again.

Alex was back.

* * *

"It's here." Deputy Falwell called to them across the department floor. In his hand was a silver flash drive, he waggled it. "Our copy from the Sound Terminal and video from the main deck inside the boat. In a familiar scene they crowded around a screen waiting for a glimpse of Nicole. Their hearts sank. They caught her at timestamp 10:43 in all her new auburn glory. She had a rounded package on her left shoulder swaddled in a familiar blanket, one of her treasured blankets Alex would recognize it anywhere. Nicole joggled the child and patted her periodically.

"Is that Immy?" Alex murmured. Her gut clenched. Were they wrong? Was her child in some seedy motel room in Mystic waiting for her captor to return, screaming and hungry?

"I can't quite…" Bobby squinted. It was so hard to tell, the footage was a little grainy and it kept flipping angles from camera to camera to camera all around the perimeter of the ship.

"She's not moving." The deputy said what both Bobby and Alex were thinking but hadn't wanted to utter.

"She would be active, squirming." Alex conceded, "Unless she's sleeping or…"

"Drugged." Bobby supplied softly, deeply horrified at the prospect.

Their answer came soon enough. Passengers started rouse and to move, gathering up bags and they drifted toward the exits. Clearly the ride was over but not quite yet for one auburn haired deviant, she paused on the near empty ship and lingered near the downturned camera lens. She looked up and made full gleaming eye contact. She gave a gentle wave with one cupped hand, smiled and then pulled back the blankets from her parcel. They all recoiled. A sack, it was a large sack of Gold Medal flour, generic and limp. Nicole blew them (Bobby) a kiss, readjusted her blankets and moved through the door marked EXIT.

They all sat gobsmacked and disgusted.

"Good luck." The chief shook his head "She's a sick one."

And so they headed home.

This was it, their final play.

* * *

Bobby was right the sage was in bloom.

And this was what it felt like to be a reality TV megastar. The camera's had scarcely stopped filming since they had intruded on that private moment in the network limo. All morning Alex had gotten such satisfaction from slamming the washroom door (one of the few places they dared not follow) or going into the chief's office where they were persona non grata. But otherwise she'd come quite quickly to the act of ignoring them, which was just what they wanted. She wondered how much of this tripe would make the 9pm broadcast. It didn't matter if she got her baby back and got zipped effortlessly across the states in their flying machine.

But yes, the sage was in bloom thick and pungent and adorning 'their' entrance to Prospect Park (the one just steps from their front door) the 9th street entrance. And her family (every single adult) was there at the sidelines. Wanting to be close but also not wanting to distract. Even her dad was stoically seated on a bench just outside the yellow tape. They gave Alex strength.

"The sleuth in the story," Bobby explained, going over what he had told the police and search team director and hour ago. "Started his search at the mother's cabin he looked into the empty bunk of the child that vanished. So I thought..."

"That we should start here too," Alex nodded loving his mind. "Outside our home."

He nodded "Then Twain's sleuth moved due south." And so did Bobby and Alex down busy Prospect Park West. "The sage was in bloom in the story and the sage in Prospect Park only blooms in the month of July. Also, inside the park you can only find sagebush in three locations." he stopped in front of the large stone obelisk monument marking the entrance "And our entrance is one of them." he smiled, "See here, he plucked it and brought the rich green leaf up toward Alex but she stalled him.

"That's okay I can smell it from here." She wrinkled her nose, it wasn't exactly a sweet aroma.

He laughed. When he was in the zone, when all the marks were being hit, when the stars were aligning, nothing but the unraveling puzzle mattered and it always made him giddy.

"It's an acquired taste." he said.

"Kind of like you." she shot back and he tossed her an amused look over his shoulder the sting was gone.

"Then," Bobby said excitedly "In the story the sleuth lead the crowing crowds, a mile to the lip of a gorge. In Prospect Park we have a ravine, but," he held up a finger leading Alex (and incidentally a camera and 2 police officers) into the park, "If you read the official park website they describe it as being comprised of a steep narrow gorge. And that gorge is exactly 1.4 miles from where we're standing."

"Well let's go." she urged needing to be part of the action.

"Ma'am. Ma'am." One of the officers stayed her with a hand, "You can't go down there. They have your instructions, they know what they're doing."

"Don't ma'am me." She gave him a look that could cut glass. "I'm a captain with the NYPD."

"They told us she would pull rank." The other patrolman murmured.

The officer that had dared to call Alex ma'am, Officer Savoy, took a deep breath and pulled himself up. Anyone looking at him could see it was bravado, he had fear and uncertainty in his eyes, "Today you're a mother and you have to stay here."

Alex gave him a black look and backed down. She was about to combust, she was tap dancing around the pathway with pent up energy and core shaking anxiety. _****__I should be the one to find her, however we find_** her.**

"The searchers know what they're doing. They've done this so many times before." The other officer said. And they knew he was right. They had managed to secure a professional ground search team, one with a pre-organized, pre-informed group of civilians. They'd showed up in their vibrant yellow 'Kings County Ground Search and Rescue' t-shirts and they didn't mess around. A large stretch of park was cordoned off. They formed concentric circles around their leader who then distributed gridded maps. Then they broke off into groups of ten, each team occupying a block of grid. Bobby and Alex had seen this before, this coordinated combing crew. It was choreography and quite beautiful in it's own way. And yet they had _never_ really _seen_ this, never as hopeful parents pacing on the periphery, hands tightly clasped (almost as if in prayer), fingers pressed to bloodless lips. Never had they felt quite so thrilled at the professionalism of these searchers with their water bottle holsters and whistles (threaded though coiled plastic bands) adorning each wrist.

_**She is going to be fine.**_

_**She is going to be fine. **_

_**She's going to be fine. **_

The wasted worried parents repeated. How could she not be? With the good intentions of so many people. With the prayers of so many.

"Tell us more about the clues that horrible excuse for a human being left you." Faith Yancy urged Bobby.

"After the gorge they move past more sagebrush and then across sand, which I think equates to the Prospect Park children's area. There are sand pits, it's located another a half mile past the gorge.

"And you think Imogen will be somewhere in that half mile radius?" Faith Yancy asked a little too coldly.

Before Bobby could answer there was the crackle of a walkie coming to life. It was strapped to an officer's hip "Jim there's blood here, so much blood. Over." The patrolman reached down and flipped the 'off' switch so fast that the talking box popped off his waist band and clattered to the ground. Alex whipped around and buried her face in Bobby's chest on a whimper because she couldn't let America see her receive the news that her child was dead.

An officer scurried over 2 minutes later. "It's not her! It's not Imogen, it was some kind of wild animal. They found a caracas."

_**More games.**_

_**I can't do this anymore.**_

Alex was numb every limb just drooped from her torso. She couldn't move, couldn't think, couldn't be sad, or enraged, or scared anymore. She was better off catatonic, she was better off dead… And then who knew how much time had elapsed, 10 minutes? An hour? When someone yelled:

"THEY FOUND HER!"

"They have her!"

"They found her!"

Everyone, every spectator, every officer, every jaded newsman erupted and burst and popped and sizzled with champagne joy. People were hugging. People were kissing, _people_ _were crying_. And Bobby and Alex, well they just stood there clinging and squinting. They looked like they were emerging from a collapsed mine shaft. They showed no sign they'd heard. There was no grand change in emotion. They had learned long ago not to surrender to their passions without evidence. So they refused, not until she was here in their arms. They wouldn't believe a word of it until they were holding Imogen.

And then a park vehicle was tearing toward them, a green pickup truck and they stared down the headlights and then they were climbing in and then they were climbing out. And then an EMT turned and he was holding something. And Alex saw that small body, those dark locks, those innocent brown eyes so frightened and wide and weepy that sweet tiny trembling lip.

Alex felt something, some kind of sound ripped right from her soul, like a growl, a groan, a scream. And she flew at them. And she took her baby and tucked her in, and cradled her against a frantically beating heart. Bobby stayed a pace back and braced his palms on his knees trying not to fall over with euphoric vertigo. And he let Alex have this, he _owed_ her this moment of private reunion. He still felt responsible. But not for too long. Moments (seconds) later he charged in and wrapped securely around them and bent his head in reverence. And they whispered things to Immy like:

"You're okay sweetheart."

"You're okay darling."

"Mommy loves you."

"Daddy loves you."

And everyone decent looked away because it was so private and so raw.

And those two parents (because they weren't cops, they were just a mom and a dad) they cried themselves hoarse, kissing and wetting their daughter with their tears.

It was a baptism.

A baptism of love and relief.


	26. Chapter 26

**Prospect Park - Part 2**

This was a dream.

No this was heaven.

They'd all died and gone there together.

Alex walked out onto the balcony and stood in dappled light watching waves crash against the shore between swaying palm trees. The water was an unnaturally natural shade of turquoise and azure. The ocean was a big rhythmic world that ignored men and their petty motivations. It shunned their gritty oily additives and eschewed their marine pilfering and shone a brilliant blue. It was a metaphor of the best kind. The sand was white. Not beige or rocky, bright white and silk between the toes. Mother natures own grist mill, she was here day in and day out without pay cheque, turning the rocks into talcum powder. The grass, the leaves, oh the shades of green! Lime and myrtle and pine and pear and kelly and emerald. It was an ocular feast. Alex gripped the railing and couldn't look away.

She felt appropriately awed by her planet right now, her life and problems in momentary perspective.

She had never left the USA (save one trip to a customs office in Canada and another to an airport in Vietnam).

She had never seen the world and now she was here with her family - whole and happy.

She was bursting, fairly brimming with life.

And then there was a familiar tug at her leg. She looked down to see a small shaky body using wads of her flesh and dress to pull up to standing.

"Hi Immy baby." she cooed, "Do you want to come and see mommy?"

Alex swung her daughter into her arms, high against her shoulder. Over the rush of the ocean she could hear Bobby snoring from their King sized bed. Confirming her suspicions that she was also married to a force of nature.

"What shall we do today baby?" she kissed the little girl's smooth cool brow. "Do you want to swim in the ocean? Do you want to tour the island? Do you want to play in the sand? Yes I think little Immy wants to play in the sand today."

And with that she was regaled with tales from a 10 month old. Imogen spoke to her without words, a stream of lyrical babble. And she let her small pale palms rest all over her mother's face and mouth and then she tugged at her long blond hair.

"Kiss for mommy." Alex implored guiltily, she had been asking for kisses around the clock in the 72 hours since they'd gotten their daughter back. She was treasuring every gooey, drippy moment of motherhood. Imogen did not play coy with her affections. She leaned forward like the tower at Pisa and slapped her whole small face against mommy's. Then she parted sticky wet lips. And Alex laughed, giggled even, cupping the head of this perfectly perfect confection masquerading as a little girl.

"Oh I missed you, I missed you, I missed you." She whispered to her baby pressing a nose to Immy's soft hair, drawing deeply on that intoxicating baby smell. Alex twirled them and danced them around the tiled terrace with a lightness only achieved by bare feet (and legs and arms) and a warm buoyant Caribbean breeze. She jiggled and tickled her little package until Immy laughed and squealed with delight.

"Wow! This is okay."

Alex heard that familiar gravelly voice behind her and both she and Immy spun to see Bobby. The prince of understatement was awake. He surveyed the landscape with new eyes, they'd only arrived last night. She looked him over from head to toe, he was so sleepy and so gigantic filling the doorway. "Are you ladies having fun?" he smiled broadly removing sleep from his eyes. It was so good to see him smile, genuinely smile.

"Oh we're catching up and we're having great big sloppy kisses." Alex said in a voice that was all for her baby. She couldn't tear herself away.

"I like kisses." He said and moved toward them. He swooped down and seized Alex's lips with his. She jumped with surprise at the way he maneuvered in for the small stolen passion. She'd been in full mommy mode and now suddenly the sexual tension was palpable. His eyes were glowing with need. She could always tell. She hadn't been denying him. They'd been close during their ordeal, but she knew he wanted more. Her mind. He wanted her mind. Their sensuality had always been about undivided attention, mental connection and complete unity. But Alex had been a woman divided for a couple of weeks now. At first she'd been trying to puzzle out his dark brooding moods and then frantic because…

_**No you aren't going to think about that. You have her in your arms, your daughter is fine.**_

But Alex was starting to feel the specter of trauma. It rose up and ruined fine moments. It was like a physical presence with her. She especially felt it in small spaces when she was supposed to be alone - like the shower or a walk-in closet or once just after she closed the car door. She knew trauma well. Trauma had been a constant companion after Jo Gage. Alex was counting on this place, this island oasis, to start the road to recovery.

They'd had to leave New York. New York was a fish bowl. They were still being stalked by the press. And the well wishers? Well some of them had turned into hangers on. It was fine on one hand, Bobby and Alex had invited the scrutiny, but on the other hand it wasn't conducive to normalcy. And of course there were the issues of real life. Work (and, yes, child care again) it wasn't as if they could stop the world and get off, they had double income realities. And then there was the issue of that beautiful apartment that had been completely violated and last (but definitely not least) there was a psychotic killer/kidnapper roaming the five boroughs with a vicious vendetta. So for now they were both on sanctioned stress leave from work. They both had 14 days and 7 would be spent here. There hadn't been a country far enough to detox from all of the evil that had assaulted them, but this little string of islands in the Caribbean Sea were going to try.

The getaway had been Bobby's idea.

**_"Let's get out of here." he whispered two nights ago in the dark of the small guest bedroom in Liz's house. They hadn't gone home. They were chicken to be perfectly honest. Afraid of the threat still looming, but even more of the emotions that those 4 walls would unleash. Instead they'd gone straight to Old Greenwich, Connecticut with their freshly returned little girl and imposed on Liz._**

**_"Out of here?" S_****_he asked for clarification._** "This room? This town? This state?" 

**_"All of the above."_**

**_"Where would we go?" she murmured._**

**_"Somewhere not here."_**

**_"That's articulate."_**

**_"I don't know, Mexico? The Caribbean? Somewhere a person would need a passport to follow us. Somewhere warm. Somewhere quiet. Somewhere calming." He wanted to protect his family, but right now they were spun, their wounds were still tender. Bobby didn't think that he and Alex had the strength to fend off another strike in their present state. And they didn't know when or where that offensive might come._**

**_That thought terrified him._**

**_"Can we afford this... 'somewhere'?" she whispered over Immy. The baby was sprawled between them. And because it was already a modest bed they were relegated to the edges. Liz (who still had every stick of her baby gear even 10 years on) had gone down to her basement and pulled a sleep separator out of large plastic bin labeled: Nathan - Infancy. Alex hadn't even asked for one, Liz'd just known intuitively that they would want to co-sleep, stay as close to their daughter as humanly possible._**

**_"We need this." Bobby continued, "We should do whatever it takes. Let's not think of it as running, just regrouping. It's our long overdue honeymoon." _**

**_Alex thought about that in the dark, under the glow of the moon. They hadn't had a honeymoon. She'd been heavily pregnant after the wedding and they'd been transitioning to big new jobs and they'd moved house. It had been a stressful period in their lives, but also the fulfilment of every dream. That whole time had glowy soft edges in her memory._**

**_"It would be nice to just be."_**

**_He nodded weaving a web around her "We wouldn't have to worry about where to stay, or about what's coming around the corner." A_****_nd then he leaned over their child and grabbed her lips softly with his, letting them linger. "Okay?" He asked against her mouth._**

**_And soon she was nodding._**

Everyone had been _so_ supportive of the idea, her whole family wanting to help. All of them perhaps realizing that the disease wasn't gone 'she' was simply in remission. All of them fearful for their sister and their new brother and their innocent baby. It was hard for Alex to admit weakness. She felt like she was always the recipient of her family's goodwill after personal disaster. But she hadn't considered their perspective. Her father had had to watch the story unfold on TV. He'd had to witness his daughter's devastation on the Faith Yancy show. He had felt inadequate in her struggle. He broke type that day and pulled _his_ baby girl into his arms. Alex had forgotten how it felt to be held (really tightly) to her fathers chest, very awkward but also very comforting.

_**"Are you okay." he asked at last grasping her chin and then tapping it up. Her eyes had watered then, but the tears stayed put. She broke away.**_

_**"We'll be okay dad."**_

_**"What are your plans?" he asked a bit gruffly.**_

_**"Just keep living I guess." she laughed without humour. Then she remembered her moonlight conversation with Bobby. "Bobby thinks we should get away for a week. Let things die down here."**_

_**"That's a very good idea." he said so quickly and so firmly that she wondered if Bobby had already called him. "Take that baby and go. Just go."**_

And then her dad (Mr 'you can't take it with you') had insisted on helping financially and he would brook no argument. He cracked into some of his savings bonds and contributed half. They took a little spending money from their own savings and then Bobby had found a local dealer and sold his treasured first edition copy of James Joyce's Finnegans Wake to make up the balance. The book had been a gift, his mother had bequeathed it to him. She had found it at an old estate sale while picking up donations for the library 30 years ago. It was her most treasured literary possession.

And Bobby had sold for his family.

He hadn't felt an ounce of conflict.

Alex and Imogen were all that mattered.

* * *

Bobby crept across the slate patio toward his daughter, "Imogen." he sing songed "Immy sweetheart." he called.

His heart swelled when she turned and smiled and squealed and shoved a fist in her mouth. He extended two big hands in her direction and thrilled at the way she moved to him. The way she _loved_ him. He scooped her up and kissed her and held close. Then in the way of fathers everywhere, he held her aloft. Almost to the roof of the partially enclosed space. Her little arms and legs kicked overhead. And then because of the laws of physics (and babies) a stream of drool created a glistening rope from her mouth to his cheek.

"You little devil." he chastised with unrestrained mirth. Lowering the child to wipe away the wet. "Goobering all over daddy." He shot a look at Alex who was vocally enjoying his comeuppance.

"That's one way to wake up." She laughed and he lunged playfully at her but she darted and dodged just out of reach.

Then as if he'd filled his exercise quota for the day, he fell heavily into one of the lounge chairs with his daughter still in arms. It shuddered and creaked under the weight of his big body, and Imogen wasted no time squirming to freedom.

"That was a short commute" Alex quipped looking down on him. "From the bed to a recliner, nice life if you can get it."

"You are just nailing me today. I'm so glad I amuse you." This time when his hand snaked out it hit it's mark, sinking into her waist like a grappling hook. He gave her his trademark look head tilted, soft imploring mocha eyes and she gave him what he wanted, settling into his lap.

"Is that a pistol in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?" She could feel him so hard beneath her it was like balancing on a boulder.

"Definitely happy. _So happy_." he gripped her hips tightly and moved against her bottom, then he strained his lips toward hers silently asking. She resisted a little but then folded into him like froth whisked into a rich thick batter.

She cupped his cheek and kissed the life out of him. Enjoying making out with her husband. His kisses were making her drunk, she let her mouth meet his again and again getting deeper and deeper each time. His hand was on her breast fingers flicking at her pert hard nipple through nearly sheer layers. She moaned she knew where this was heading, and her body desperatly wanted to follow that enticing path. Inside her things were clenching and engorging and drenching.

"I want you." he said in that seductive whisper, that rough sinister way he had.

She let her fingers trip over his bare abdomen lower, then lower. And then they stopped just short of what he wanted. "Later." she whispered drawing his earlobe into her mouth, "When she's asleep..." Suddenly every inch of her body went rigid and she threw her head back and forth in abject panic. She sprang to her feet searching the small space.

**_She wasn't here she was gone._**

Alex tore into the room, looking around wildly.

_**Not again!**_

Imogen was there not far from the door standing holding on to the bed linens. Alex flew at her with such force and momentum that it startled the small child and caused her to lose grip and fall back. And she _wailed_. And some very adult guilt ensued. Alex got down on her knees and held Immy. And then a breast was bared and a small mouth latched and in the sweet pull of nourishment (and mutual comfort) all was forgotten.

But Bobby had watched. Saw Alex's stark irrational reaction from beneath the lintel.

His brow furrowed.

They were going to need more then a vacation to set this right.


	27. Chapter 27

"I'd like to cash it all in and move here." Alex murmured peeking out from under a beach umbrella to feel the warmth of the sun on her upturned face. They were on a private beach in Aruba on the grounds of their all-inclusive resort. Before them a lay a vista of sea and sand layered with multicoloured, multi-shaped bodies dotted as far as the eye could see.

"Okay." Bobby said fliply. He was only half joking. The impulse to run was still strong in him.

"That was easy." She laughed.

"This is paradise." he said "What's to think about."

"I'm sure I could be happy here," Alex mused "I'd sell produce at the roadside."

He paused trying to imagine his Alex doing that. "No overhead, short days, I'll handle the lock box."

She paused and tried to imagine her Bobby doing that.

They laughed.

"That would be a simple happy life." she said a bit wistfully.

He felt a twinge of sadness that she was pining for things she so deserved, things he should be giving her. "Alex, I just want to make you happy."

He said it so earnestly that she took off her sunglasses and met his eyes. "I know." She did know. She knew every atom of this man, even the parts that periodically went astray. He would never intentionally hurt her. Unfortunately all of his unintentional wounds stung just as much.

"When this little-bit turns 18," he looked at Immy "we'll buy a shack and live island style. Deal?" he held out a big palm. And she took it firmly and shook. And they both looked over at their daughter who was also sitting in the shade of a broad pink umbrella. She was marvelling at sand and they marvelled at the person they had created together.

**_That sand is going to be in every orifice_** Alex thought as the little girl sprinkled it over her head and gave it a taste.

"Immy no." she shook her head theatrically "Noooooo." The child froze and looked up, with wide 'I'm so busted' eyes. She was a miracle. She was learning meaning.

Time inched by. 5 minutes were more like 5 hours here, with nothing to do and nowhere to go.

"… and this whole just _show up and eat_ thing works for me too." he continued. The joys of a package vacation. It wasn't exactly authentic island living, but their lives in New York were plenty authentic, thank you very much. Here they just wanted rest and anonymity and recuperation. The resort restaurants (there were 5) were great. And they even had picnic champagne lunch vouchers for the 4 of the 7 days. They definitely would not starve on this island.

"I'll bet."

"What exactly are you saying?"

"I'm saying they would have charged us for a third head if they'd known how you eat."

"Low blow."

She looked at him objectively lying there in his blue trunks. He looked like Bobby circa_** Hmmm what case? Maybe the Dockerty one. **_In her head all of their key moments were marked by casefiles, Dockerty had been the year his mom passed. He was older now of course, but who wasn't? She'd liked looking at him back then and she loved looking at him now. Alex thought of those years flanking his mom's death. They were after he'd shed his lean, mean youthful arrogance, but before life had really started kicking his ass.

There was something firmer about him now, though. His body (like his attitude) had matured in its composition. They were both in good shape. Now they had Imogen to focus on, they both in better mental health.

"You look great. I wouldn't change a thing about you" She said and she honestly wouldn't. Not the insensitive parts, not the weak parts, not the detached parts because he wouldn't be Bobby then would he? No part of him existed in isolation.

He sensed they were talking about more then his physique.

"Thanks." Her words pleased him so.

* * *

At one point when the sun was just past midway across the sky Alex pulled herself up in the lounger and then she reached over and snagged Imogen. She put the child to her breast. Her milk seemed to have rebounded from their days off schedule, she was doing more micro feeds just in case. Suddenly keeping her milk was _a mission_. Suddenly Alex wasn't sure she would quit breastfeeding at a year.

Everything was different now.

Without looking at Bobby she finally said what she'd been needing to for days. "I don't blame you. Well I did, but I don't anymore. I'm over it. We need to move forward."

His gut clenched. He knew exactly what she was talking about. Nicole. "Do you mean that? Don't say it if you don't mean it."

"Oh, you think I'm going to pull it out in every argument from here to eternity?" She smiled, "You left the butter out and remember that time you didn't tell me Nicole was back!" she did her best to sound serious.

He smiled in spite of himself, "Yeah something like that."

"Well I won't. This is too painful to rehash." She made eye contact with her suckling child and drew patterns in her dark downy hair.

He so wanted to be done with this topic, but he felt compelled to explain, "I really just _didn't think. _It was like it was 2003 again. I just lost sight of everything. None of it was conscious deception Alex. I should have acted. I should have been a man. But I - I was paralyzed. I didn't choose her over you. I didn't choose the puzzle." He sat up and touched Alex's arm to get her attention "_I swear didn't_. I just shut down. I lived that whole time on some retrograde autopilot."

She nodded. She put Immy back down to play and slathered on another layer of sunscreen, slowing her brain by making work for her hands. She believed him. Inside Robert Goren was a deep, dark, lonely place. He didn't share naturally. His turmoil was always revealed with great struggle. She knew that. She couldn't plead ignorance. She had almost left him and had an abortion, that's how deeply she knew that. They would always be fighting his damaged parts. What benefit would there be to punishing him now? If they'd lost Immy - the mere thought brought tears to her eyes - but they hadn't. Now they needed to trust each other.

Still, lest he feel he was getting off easy she couldn't resist a warning. "But if you do it again," She looked him dead in the eye, "Choose something or someone over me, over Imogen, it will be worse then betrayal." Her voice ran icy, so at odds with the climate. "We'll be over. I'll know that you can't be married. I'll know this," she toggled a finger, "this domesticity, is too much to ask of you. I _will_ let you go."

He felt slapped.

She was different.

She was hard.

He was her soft spot, he always had been, he knew that. He'd been brusk with her for years, given her very little reason to be his friend and still she'd taken care of him, she'd always had his back. But now there was a thin shim of metal between them. He had hurt her, _deeply._ And this was how she saw it. She still thought he was torn about what he wanted. She thought he was drawn to Nicole and might be again. She thought he wouldn't choose her. She was so wrong. He had lifetime of making up and reassuring to do, so he started right there under a cerulean Caribbean sky. "I don't want her. I have NEVER wanted her. I just want you."

"Okay." Her word was short and quiet.

Alex glanced over at Imogen, the little girl was an arms length away banging a shovel and bucket together. Alex looked over every 5 seconds. He'd counted. It was a compulsive turn of the head. Bobby read it. She was afraid. What she was doing, was only a facsimile of relaxation on the beach, inside she was coiled to spring. Bobby knew she had factored the amount of time it would take to snatch Imogen up and run from danger. He was harbouring anxieties as well, but Alex was being damaged by them, he could tell.

"I love you." He said suddenly and she turned to look at him.

One beat. Two. Three. Four...

"I love you too." She'd hesitated but she couldn't lie.

Then she reached into her beach bag and pulled out a magazine, some celebrity rag, signalling to him that they were done.

As Alex flipped the glossy pages full of outrageous imagery her keen sense of irony kicked in. Her little family was running from the press but by buying and reading this magazine she was feeding the machine. _She_ was part of the public that wanted every detail. She pushed the thought away. She couldn't waste time considering the big picture. It was every man for himself on this twirling blue and green ball in space. And right now this magazine was just the kind of light, mindless, nonsense she needed. 'How does Scar-Jo Keep her Butt so Perky?' Alex lay back in the lounger and started to read the answer. What gal didn't want a pert backside?

All the while she was aware of his gaze still on her.

His endless consideration.

The sun had nothing on the heat of Bobby Goren's eyes.

"Do you want your book?" She asked not looking up but sliding her big black shades in place again.

"No."

Five minutes passed.

"You're staring." She took a sip of warm bottled water.

"I've never seen that suit before."

She glanced down at her bathing suit it was a fitted tankini that covered most of her abdomen keeping her in that post baby comfort zone, but it did bare a strip of midriff. Alex had never been one to reveal great amounts of flesh but this was another Liz coerced purchase. Her sister that had convinced her not to hide behind a one piece. And she'd listened. The tank portion was a striking coral halter, the bikini bottom was coral as well but with a eye grabbing, hip enhancing white belt.

"No? Well I was pregnant last summer so it's been gathering dust in some drawer. It's Liz's favourite." Her sister and sister-in-law had done their packing for this trip.

"It… it fits so well."

She laughed "Thanks. I think."

"And those lactating breasts are so…" his gaze fixed on her chest, "Ripe."

Alex smiled and looked down at her assets then at him, he was right. Her suit was from 2 summers and a full cup size ago. She was popping forth. And there was nothing like a couple of weeks of worry (capped with 60 hours of debilitating fear) to get a postpartum woman to her goal weight. 10 pounds had slid off her frame just like that. **_I highly recommended the 'have a baby and then almost die losing her' breast augmentation and weight loss plan_** Alex thought sardonically.

"Down boy." she cracked.

"I… Your legs…"

"What about them?"

"Come wrap them around me."

Her jaw dropped. "What a mouth."

"It's just been _so long_." he ran a single slow finger up the outside of her thigh.

"Not sex on a crowded beach long."

"Speak for yourself." she thought she heard him mumble and he shifted in his seat pulling a little on his tightening blue trunks. "Speaking of 'From Here to Eternity'..."

"Were we speaking of from here to eternity?" she spoke over him.

"Feel like a beach scene?" he waggled his eyebrows. And she threw the bottle of sunscreen at him.

"I'm going to take your daughter for a swim." she stood, but she couldn't resist enticing him a little, leaning down to plump her breasts and create new deeper cleavage, adjusting her halter, fiddling with the minute bikini bottom and it's fit over her bum, stretching and flexing. His eyes tracked every twist and bend.

"Alex…" the word sounded strangled. He could almost taste his _need_. He watched her hips sway as she moved around preparing to go. He watched the small of her back and her narrow shoulders. **_She is delicate, physically and emotionally_**. He'd never thought that before.

"Show's over." she winked but it wasn't, not quite, she treated him to a deep bend to pick up Immy.

**_Her ass,_** he thought, _**is a masterpiece**_. And there was something arousing, about watching _his_ woman cradling _his_ child. He felt like he was standing on a mount surveying his land. He felt like his seed was strong. He felt like she would kill him in so many ways if she ever found any of this out.

To Alex this was risqué, and his arousal was flattering but also a little bit curious. It felt different. It felt like she had the upper hand. Their crisis had been a rebirth for them. They were seeing each other in ways they never had, as human - both frail and weak, but also sexual and new. Suddenly they were two distinct people that had made a commitment to one another of free will. They didn't _have_ to stay together, they needed to _want _to stay together.

Alex had felt for all those years working with him that she could never leave Bobby. She'd as soon cut off a limb as do that. Was it strange that now, with his child and with a marriage contract, now that she was bound to him more tightly then she'd ever been, that she felt liberated? She understood that she _could_ make her way without him. And further still she _would_ if he didn't respect their commitment. She supposed that was the hallmark of a good union, it made you more confident about yourself as an individual.

And because he couldn't take his eyes off her and because he was silently begging her to forgive him, she felt powerful.

A benevolent not a malevolent power.

A new layer of strength.

* * *

"She's sleeping. Finally." Alex sighed walking out onto the terrace.

"That little girl is tough work."

"Tell me about it." It had been an energetic breastfeeding session. Immy kept sitting up to 'talk.' And she had a new habit, it seemed like she was trying multi-task - play and eat at the same time. The result was a lot nipple pulling. Imogen was growing and changing. "That was a nipple workout." Alex cupped the sides of her breasts for effect. "I'm going to take a shower. I feel so sticky and sandy." That was the very moment Bobby realized that her tone, pitch or intention didn't matter. He wanted her and every single word sounded kinky.

"I'll join you." he stood.

"Oh you will, will you?"

"You've been teasing me all day."

Her eyebrows went up.

"Make out sessions, tiny bathing suits, wiggling around in these minuscule dresses." he let the fabric float through his fingers.

She looked down. **_Minuscule!_** It was a perfectly modest sundress she couldn't very well wear a parka on a tropical island.

"You're just horny." she huffed. "There are a lot of twenty-something _libido boosters_ at this resort."

He pulled her close and caressed her bottom, "I'm not looking anywhere but here." he squeezed. Then she felt those big aggressive hands edging her dress up and dipping between her thighs.

"Okay, okay come on." she grabbed him. "But the rule is that I get to shower first. I've got sand bad places." She paused to lock the balcony door and draw the blackout drapes. Then she broke way to double check the locks on the front door. He watched her rig up a simple trip wire without much thought, moving a small end table in front of the door and perching the metal ice bucket and tongs on the absolute edge.

Now it was his turn to raise a brow.

"We can't be too safe." she explained.

He wondered at that. Was she right? Or was this post traumatic stress induced paranoia?

* * *

The shower was a big glass box with a lot of heads and jets and a large resin (rattan look) bench inside. In a bit of good luck there was more then enough room for two, no tub, but they ware making it work with Imogen. Alex left the bathroom door open and the wanted to leave the glass one ajar as well.

"We'll flood the place." he griped but when she worked her hands down under his shorts he got amnesia.

He took his sweet time removing her dress, kissing every centimetre of revealed flesh, smoothing the straps down. "Are we actually going to get into the shower today?"

"Don't rush me. I've been waiting all day for this package to arrive."

She laughed at that.

He drew in a sharp breath. "Where did this come from?" He'd stumbled across her tropical print push up bra and panties they were all palms and flowers.

"My sisters were very concerned that we have a good time." she murmured.

"Your unnatural closeness to your family is paying off." his lips slid to her neck then down her chest.

"Excuse me?" there was a hint of laughter there.

"I didn't say words." he quipped and buried his nose in her cleavage to distract her. "Mmmmm you smell like salt and sun."

"And exactly how does sun smell Wordsworth?"

He grabbed her then, hiking her small sassy body roughly up. She yelped and it made him harder. He pinned her against the stone wall of the shower then he kissed her. And kissed her and kissed her and kissed her. Until she didn't have a rejoinder or a clue. His lips were so soft his tongue so wild.

"You're a good kisser." she said dreamily like a freshman on a first date. "I don't want to know where you honed your skills though."

"There were men staring at you on the beach today." he said instead, "I almost murdered one of them."

"Really?" she sounded pleased.

"Don't sound so pleased or surprised. Have you looked in the mirror lately?" he spun them. Suddenly he was a broad hairy canvass for her small lingerie covered form. And they peered into the large framed looking glass together. She gasped. She didn't recognize herself. Hair! There was so much of it, so blonde and with natural volume from his fingers, her lips were smudged and engorged, her lipstick was definitely outside the lines, her skin was sun kissed and glowing and her body (the one she had taken so much pain to hide since having Immy) wasn't the grotesque unruly form she imagined. It was different, more proportioned, more hourglass. The fractional widening of her hips combined with a little extra padding on either side balanced her out. Who was this woman? Alex knew herself. She tapered from the shoulder. She_ hated_ that she tapered. A cone, that was the 'flattering' term she'd found online for her shape. She liked this, this was more womanly. Having his child had changed her body and soul.

Then it was all too much. She flipped around and buried her face in his chest.

"My favourite view." he said hotly still watching them in the mirror his hands sliding and cupping testing the weight of her bum. Then he pushed away her panties uncovering the object of his fetish. She felt exhilarated. Being Robert Goren's fixation, his sole objective was like being in the heart of a hurricane.

"Water we need water to make this shower work." she joked biting his chest.

"Just… just let me…" He drew a finger down and dipped it into her warmth. He wanted to slip himself inside her. He felt a powerful urge to take her without her consent. He was losing control. He could smell her, feel her, he licked her neck so he could taste her.

Her voice cut through, "Bobby you promised me, you promised actual cleansing would happen here."

He growled low and angry and frustrated and flicked on the water. It was a libido quelling, sputter inducing stream of ice. She screamed and dove to safety.

"Oh no you don't. You come over here and get clean." He said wanting to punish her a little.

"It's cold." she screeched "too cold." But he pulled and eventually won their tug of war. His grip moving from her wrist to securely around her middle he dumped her under the sheet of frigid water. "You're horrible. You're evil." she shivered in his grasp.

"MWAH HA HA HA HA."

She smiled at his delicious cartoon evil, all beaded water and faux malice. "You soaked my new undies." She pulled off the bra throwing it to freedom.

"With desire?"

"Ugh." she slapped him. "With ice cold water!" She said between clenched chattering teeth, "And stop manhandling me!" She secretly loved being tossed around. But Alex was a feminist and outrage was her obligation. He adjusted the temperatures and set her down under the broad, flat, leaf-shaped shower head. It felt like a warm summer storm. She clung to him in the 'rain' while he lathered up his hands with the sweet Mango scented body wash and found every nook, every curve, every fold. Then he sat on the bench and she stood between his splayed legs and shampooed his hair. Making soapy whirls and tufts. And then he stood behind her and returned the kindness sinking long fingers into her thin blond tresses working up a cloud of bubbles. Eventually (it felt like an eternity to him) they were rinsed and sleek and clean.

"We smell like a mango grove. Now can we…"

She didn't speak. All the words had been spoken, they'd already fogged the glass and the issue. Clarity came from her actions. She got up on her toes rubbing her aroused wet body against his. She forced his head down and took his mouth licking droplets that ran past and clung to his lips. An anxious part of his anatomy bucked and pushed against her and without jockeying, adjusting or any real awkwardness he lifted her just enough to ease inside. Alex clung and stretched around him.

And then they both stopped and stood stalk still.

They looked at each other and smiled.

"Bed." they said in unison.

He flew them there, the speed lifting the wet hair off her neck. Then he pinned her to the bed under him. And he pinned her hands over her head. He planted his knees wide parting her, stretching her on the rack of his body.

He dominated.

She couldn't move.

But he could, and he did, just his hips, clenching his buttocks a throaty "Ahhhh." with each thrust.

Her thighs twitched and trembled and wanted to shut.

Her fingers opened and closed around phantoms.

"Bobby." She moaned in sweet helpless frustration as her body accepted him (without conditions) over and over and over.

* * *

The sheets were damp and they were breathless and clinging in the blackened room. He got up and opened the drapes so that they could see the moon and each other. Then he returned to her sticky grasping embrace.

"What should we do?"

"Have lots and lots more animal sex." her voice was husky and slow.

He laughed.

"I mean when we get home. How are going to stop this bitch?"

She went rigid. "Just get me a clear shot."

"Oh God Alex." he pulled her in tight, he didn't want to lose her to that act, or the punishment "We can't… Can we?"

"We can. This is our conspiracy." She whispered, "This is when we say things that are illegal and wrong and that are _going_ to happen."

"You want to hunt her down and kill her."

She nodded "And make the body disappear. Like it never existed. If we don't she will never stop. And we'll live in fear."

"Okay. How? Do we find her I mean?"

"Logan."

"Logan?"

"Logan."

"Okay." he whispered.

"What else?"

"Declan. I need to find out what the hell… How could he have…" Bobby didn't even have words for this level of betrayal.

"Yeah we have to talk to Declan."

"And we have go back to the story. It was so spot on, maybe there's more there." Immy had been found exactly where Bobby said she would be. And she had been wrapped in a vintage Navajo blanket. A kindly native had taken her in - just like the story.

**_Nicole loved her fucking games. _**

**_But her luck was about to run out. _**

"Let's not ruin this vacation."

"No. Let's not."

And he pulled her atop him. And she positioned him and took him inside her deeply. She sat tall on his pelvis looking into his eyes. She was filled to overflowing - with his love, with his body. She moaned and brought his big warm palm to her mouth and kissed it.

His breath shuddered.

She let her head fall back.

She began to move.


	28. Chapter 28

**A/N: I think it's time for a little critical analysis. This story is kind of dark but I still wanted it to have moments of lightness kind of like life. I hope I'm achieving that. I think it's easy to lose the nuance in fan fiction because characters (especially those taken from screen) are so bright and shiny and obvious, but people in the real world are opaque - they have secrets and they lie and they put on a brave face. They are happy also, but in my experience even in the best of times true happiness is a fleeting emotion. So I wanted to try and bring all that to this story.**

**I love the reviews. I love how some people are bloodthirsty and some people are horrified at Bobby and Alex and their moral decline. I also like that some people see Bobby's reassurances as inadequate, because they are. Love isn't about words it's about actions and his actions and words have been at odds. So of course he doesn't feel completely authentic.**

**I also wanted to note that because I've added a child to mix Nicole is not as benign a threat as she was during the TV series. A threat to a nephew or a brother or a partner (as we saw in the series) is going to pale in comparison to a threat to ones own child. I don't think that there's a wrong way to write them in this situation. Parents in the real world have murdered (publicly and in cold blood) people that hurt their children. And on the flip side parents have forgiven and even formed relationships with people that harmed their children. I think it's a moment where fear (or goodness) can eclipse rationality.**

**Anyway, I'm having a ball with this story and the mystery aspect is really stretching me as a writer.**

**Thank you for reading and reviewing everyone.**

* * *

In New York they didn't really do restaurants with Immy, much less fine dining, so this holiday was trial by fire.

Restaurants in the morning (sometimes at noon) and definitely during the witching hour, which for Imogen was between 5 and 7pm. In all fairness she was a good baby most of the time. Alex employed some of the techniques she'd come up with on their long rush hour commutes to Inwood. Alex was a now a certified master distractor. And of course most people that lost patience (you had to look closely to see the exasperation, it was in a harshly tossed napkin or a gusty sigh) were then treated to what Bobby called the 'Immy Effect.' Her dreamy wide gaze and her new engaging personality - their girl was becoming a smily little flirt - softened even the most irate patron's death glare.

But this was their last day in paradise.

And it was definitely bittersweet.

This morning they were sitting in their favourite restaurant, The Sundial. Aptly named because it was circular, sat proud of a hilltop, and had a gnomon that cast an accurate shadow. The tables inside were covered with an array of glasses and cutlery for each setting, which marked it as on the ritzy side of normal. But what a view! From it's hilltop perch overlooking the marina, the trees were descending balls of green that stopped in a perfect bow at the sandy beach line. White boats bobbed like gulls in the water. Looking out the window of this restaurant was like looking into a photoshopped HD image. So Bobby and Alex and Imogen came here most. This was a place that deserved a spot in the memory bank.

Alex watched Bobby tuck into a large omelette and 3 pieces of toast. She on the other hand kept it light in the morning. She glanced down at her own fruit, yogurt and whole wheat crust.

"Just remember when we get home that I am not an all inclusive resort." she jabbed. If they hadn't come on this vacation they'd never have known. They'd never have known that Robert Goren was built for the good life. Room service and custom prepared meals and turndown service and a bellman and his favourite - a concierge that was prepared to answer the most inane questions at the most inane hours of day or night. He'd done it all. And Alex was finding that he wasn't the least bit shy. She'd come down from the room this morning to find him flashing his pearly whites at the befuddled front desk staff.

"What was that all about?" She asked breezing in wearing the cobalt blue maxi she loved so well. Their little princess was perched on her hip busy marvelling at the glint of her gold accessories. Immy loved bangles best but just yesterday Alex had screech at her for pulling a dangly earring a bit too hard. She hadn't done it since.

"Oh nothing." he said cavalierly.

But when she glanced over they were all still looking at him. One woman had that gooey_ I've been Goren'd_ face.

"That'll teach me to leave you alone." Alex rolled her eyes. She had been upstairs grooming, taking an extra 20 minutes to add a messy wave to her hair. She was coming out of herself. After yesterday, after he'd shown her that she was beautiful and that he was absolutely insanely obsessed by her physical form, she was ready to work at it and ready to wring that response from him again.

If Alex took nothing from this nightmare with Nicole and from all of their combined personal tragedy, it was that they only had one life. She'd spent too many years hiding her light under a bushel. So she'd taken the curling wand in hand this morning with the best of intentions. Unfortunately Bobby had been such a whirling dervish, such a big, bouncing, restless distraction that she had banished him to the lobby to wait.

Was it her fault that his regime was rolling out of bed, throwing on a pair of linen shorts and a white t - shirt, then sliding his massive feet into brown leather flip flops? Was it her fault that she had depilation, makeup, hair and breastfeeding, while his product regime was slapping a dime sized dollop of gel in his hair, a dash of deodorant and a mist of body spray? What woman could compete with a 6 minute dressing and beautification routine? Not even the most butch Alex was willing to bet.

"Why does she look dumbstruck." Presently Alex tilted her head at the attendent.

"It was nothing really," He smiled "Just small talk. We were chatting about the island. I told them how beautiful it was and how wonderful they had made our stay here."

Later she tugged a little more of the truth from him, the conversation had been less about _their_ stay and more _his, _a little bachelor revival. Then he'd told them that he was with the FBI and done a magic trick. Powerful and charming, a double whammy.

"What trick?" She'd asked curious about her Don Juan.

A simple but effective sleight of hand. He'd pulled a bloom, a Wanglo (the national flower of Aruba) from behind the desk attendant's flushed ear, then tucked it into her lapel. That (and a big tip) had sealed him as their favourite guest.

* * *

The setting sun was a slice of orange shot through with pinks and purples and deep deep blues. It was their last Aruban sunset. It was a spectacular sight from their loungers on the terrace of room 248. The conversation on the other hand wasn't nearly as tranquil.

"She'll be fine." he kept his voice calm and soothing.

"You have got to be kidding Bobby."

"The hotel has a reliable service and she'll be asleep."

"No!" Alex shouted short and sharp.

"We can hand pick the person."

"I said NO!"

Their flight left in the morning at 11am. Tonight he just wanted to be a grown up. He wanted a single kid free evening in the restaurant (come nightclub) 800 yards from the door of their room. He wanted to twirl Alex around the dance floor. He wanted to put on the suit that had been packed for him but not worn. He wanted to see her in that slinky sequined thing - **_thank you Liz!_** - that he had caught sight of in the suitcase. However all of this was a fantasy because it was contingent on Alex leaving Imogen with a stranger. He had checked into the service as thoroughly as he could - she was a bonded, insured, CPR certified, 10 year hotel employee with 5 kids of her own - but a stranger nonetheless.

Alex wasn't ready.

Part of him didn't blame her.

He wasn't ready either, no, amendment, he _was_ ready to have fun, he just wished they could be in two places at once.

Bobby felt like an asshole for even suggesting something as frivolous as a night out given what they'd been through, but suggest it he did, because leaving Imogen was inevitable. He thought of the life they were going back to. Then he thought of the manic mothering he'd witnessed over the course of this vacation. How was Alex going to leave Immy? How was Alex going to place her in someone else's hands and go to work everyday? _How?_ Bobby knew that some violent separation anxiety was only 7 and a half days from now.

The answer had to be baby steps, starting on this safe resort, but his wife was melting down.

"Don't ask me to leave her! Don't you care about her at all?!" Alex shouted. "Dancing! How the hell would I be able to dance?"

This wasn't the way he wanted to end this vacation. Of course Aruba hadn't been all sunshine and beaches. Of course they had this mess still looming, but the getaway had served it's purpose. It had gotten them out of the line of fire. It had straightened out some of the anger between them, it had reaffirmed their commitment and _God the sex_. It wasn't like anything they'd ever had, it was like a flash bomb every time he touched her. He'd been semi-erect the entire week. They had laughed and joked and flirted. She hadn't cried, not once. They had eaten great food, they had bought souvenirs at the market, they had bumped along some sketchy island roads in a Jeep 4x4 with a tour guide and swam in the sea.

"Think about it Alex. We don't have to do this tonight," He conceded, "But you _will_ have to leave her at some point."

She turned away from him.

She stood and moved to the corner and gripped the railing.

She couldn't catch her breath.

He was right she would. She would have to give her baby to a stranger again.

**_Oh God!_**

Her heart raced.

What was this? This feeling. Horrible debilitating anxiety coursed through her. She grabbed her chest. Then her throat.

"Alex?" he asked immediately sensing a change in the air. "Alex?" He stood now too. "Alex?" Now he saw it, actually physical distress. He moved quickly to her. "What is it?"

She gripped her chest. She couldn't breathe. She was going to die. She was going to die in this hotel room in front of her baby and her husband. She could hear herself pulling in air but it wasn't going down.

He rested big hands on her shoulders. "Breathe Alex. Breathe." His own breath short and fast. "Breathe!" he demanded again. Then he knew, "It's a panic attack. I - it's panic. Breathe, you can do this. Breathe." he begged.

And the label seemed to help her.

"You're here with me." He reassured "Immy is safe."

She clutched him, so tightly.

"Like yoga Alex. Long, slow and deep."

She remembered. She remembered her training, she remembered how to manually settle her pulse and clear her mind. She remembered achieving a higher realm of calm through yoga. And with that memory the breath broke through.

He let his forehead rest against hers. Feeling his own breath slow and sweet relief flood every inch of his body. "That's a definite no to dancing." he said trying to get them back to normal and he was rewarded with her short sharp laugh.

He took her hand and brought her inside to the comfy chair and pulled her into his lap. She curled up against him like a cat. She was silent.

"I love you." His whispers were a calming stream of consciousness. "I love you. We'll figure out something we can live with. Imogen will be safe. Nothing will happen to her. Imogen will be safe. I love you…"

And they cuddled their last night away inside that room and watched a black and white movie and ordered a decadent chocolate dessert.

And Imogen slept on oblivious to her absolute importance.

* * *

Their flight touched down at 4:15pm and there was no more avoiding home and quite honestly they were ready to go back, they were tired of being transient. They were silent in the taxi ride from LaGuardia. Except for Immy whose car seat was clipped between them, she looked from her mommy to her daddy over and over squawking and bleating and trying to engage, but it was no use.

There were no boogeymen inside their brownstone, a sweep came up empty and all listening and recording devices had been removed a week ago. It was clean, squeaky clean and bright. Each subsequent room smelled like lemons and lavender. Alex knew she would never be able to repay her family for their kindness during this (and every other) ordeal. She opened the fridge and instead of an impending grocery trip, she found it stocked, complete with labelled freezer meals.

"Do you have siblings or just a fairy godmother?" He remarked then dodged her swat.

She smiled, "This is Will." She ran a finger over the gleaming countertop. "He likes to throw money at a problem." Alex suspected a cleaning service had been involved but the meals and food, they screamed Arianna, Jack's wife. She was very much about home and hearth.

"What do you think?" Bobby said eventually still looking around and she got his meaning. Could they do this? Could they live here? Was everything ruined?

"I still love it." She murmured running her fingers over the bumps and dips of the millwork. And she did, it was something about the quality of the light, something about the orientation to the park, something about every moment before Nicole's intrusion having been so comfortable and homely, just as Alex had always hoped their life together would be. And there was the issue of Immy. Of course she was only an infant, she would be fine anywhere, but it was undeniably obvious that their little girl was ecstatic to be home, crawling around to touch everything under 3 feet, trying to get into the ottoman that housed her toys, peering over the edge of her playpen.

"I'd get a shaman in to cleanse the bad energy but…"

She gave him a stony look. His jokes were going down like a led balloon today.

"Okay, sorry." he dropped down onto the sofa, "How about someone more practical… t - t - to talk to I mean."

"Who?" She leaned against the counter and stared at him quizzically.

"Gyson."

"Your Gyson?"

"Or yours, if you talk to her." This definitely classified as a dark time and Paula Gyson had told him to call in just such an event.

"I don't know." her face twisted "A shrink Bobby?" Her attitude was all cop and a holdover from 1PP, when a psych mandate had been a headache, but there was something about _seeking_ help, about admitting you needed it and courting it's effects that was transformative. Bobby had experienced that and he had evolved. Gyson had helped him. And like the truly helped he wasn't cynical anymore.

"We nee..."

The doorbell rang cutting off his words and they looked at each other. Bobby sprang to it first. They weren't expecting anyone. They had piles of voicemails and emails and gifts from well wishers, but no one had contacted them. On the other side of the door was an enormous bouquet of flowers. The delivery man (Bobby could tell it was a man from the breadth of his shoulders) was almost completely obscured by blooms.

"Whoa." Alex said at the sight of them, bowled over by the size and expense of such a huge delivery. It was an explosion of purples and yellows and whites "Card?"

He set them down on the counter with a clank and dug around for the square of white paper, finally pulling it free. Alex peered around him to read:

**All is right with the world.**

**Bobby, I hope you had a smashing vacation**

**and that you make a real effort to move foreword.**

**Nicole.**

Without a seconds hesitation Alex picked up the exquisite bouquet and stuffed it into a large black garbage bag then carried it out of the apartment.

"She spelled the word forward wrong." Bobby sighed staring at the card. He was thinking they should buckle in, they were about to be taken on a bumpy ride.

"Don't let her work you." Alex glared then pinched the bridge of her nose. "She knows that you can't resist."

In so many ways Alex felt like the child that wasn't invited to play. She was alien to these two minds, ever pitted and relentlessly butting. Bobby and Nicole were always riddling and unraveling. And there Alex stood, plain, burdened with an average IQ with her face pressed up against the glass. She didn't like it. Despite Bobby's claims to the contrary Nicole owned a part of him, a part she could energize with just a misspelled word.

"Aren't you curious?" He asked and she could see his mind locking in even though she'd asked him not to.

"I want to find her, but I don't really care how her diseased mind works."

"I think we'll find her this way." he urged shaking the card. He was already moving toward his laptop completely single minded now. "Actually can I borrow your e-reader?" He wanted to download the exact version of his anthology, the one Nicole was using to execute her grand plan.

"Please do." Alex said with sarcastic venom and he was so enthralled that he barely noticed. Alex was skating a line. Alex really believed she had it in her to end Nicole's wasted life and yet she had sugary dreams where she and Bobby just went back to living and Nicole disappeared without any further effort. But Alex wasn't a naive woman, neither scenario was going to happen easily. In order for this to be over she knew they would have to trade away something valuable.

And then Alex saw it.

She understood the endgame with absolute clarity.

She finally _got_ Nicole.

Alex had been wracking her mind since all of this chaos had descended on them. She had wondered why? If Nicole was alive and had managed to game the system for years why had she come back? Why was she here messing with them? Why didn't she just live with the vile impunity she'd come accustomed to? Why wasn't she off fucking a swath through the Thai countryside or conning another gullible millionaire? And now Alex knew why. Alex had an epiphany right there in her kitchen. Nicole's 'dying' words to Declan were the only lie she'd never told. **"Tell Bobby he's the only man I ever loved."**

Alex pressed the back of her hand to her mouth and felt _so stupid_. It was so obvious now.

Nicole was here for Bobby.

Taking Imogen, that was a message for Alex: **_I want what you have and I can take it. _**Suddenly Nicole needed him. Maybe it was age, maybe she was sick but something had made her decide to come for him and this moment was nearly 15 years in the making. Nicole had always both valued and reviled Bobby's words it was part of their intimate dance. She both respected and despised him. Bobby only had himself to blame Alex thought he'd always humanized her, always given her reason to view him as a touchstone, a sympathetic. His words floated back to Alex, echoes from a 10 year old interrogation.

**'I believe that there is a part of you that loves Gavin, the decent part of Nicole that's hidden in that bunker you call a heart. ****Well you blew it Nicole! Your one chance for happiness with Gavin. One chance and you had to come back to me. You couldn't leave well enough alone."**

Even back then he'd seen her budding infatuation with him. And foreshadowed this moment.

Alex knew Nicole. She couldn't really love. This havoc she was reeking on them was her unreasonable approximation of that emotion. Her videos were to addressed to Bobby, her notes were to Bobby, her phone calls to Bobby, her puzzles for Bobby. No one one else existed. Alex knew Nicole would try to win him the only the way she knew how. She would need to isolate him. How else could she turn him to her?

**_Only if he has nothing left._**

Alex had a sudden sharp image of herself as the next bit of collateral damage, a box to be ticked on a serial killer's hit list.

She should be scared.

Her intestines should be floating in bilious terror but all she could think was: _**Bring it on.**_

* * *

He came rushing into the living room 30 minutes later.

"I have to get to Dec. I need to see Declan right now."

"What? Why?"

"The entire foreword from my version of the anthology is about mentors." He held up her e-reader and read an excerpt. "Though our careers were a generation apart Twain was a mentor to me. His words took me in and taught me how to harness my energy and observations..." Bobby felt he could have written those words to Declan. And the similarities didn't end there the rest was like an ode from a man to a respected father figure.

"So this is about Declan?"

"Maybe, maybe not, but let's go." he urged.

"Someone has to wait here for the locksmith." She insisted. This being stalked was an expensive proposition. They needed an alarm system, new locks, window devices that prevented opening. There was no way Alex was sleeping another night in this place if it wasn't a fortress.

"I am not leaving you two alone here." he insisted.

"I can take care of myself."

"Yeah. I know. Let's go." he said anxious and dismissive and he wasn't even going to humour her bravado.

Alex looked at her watch, it was after 7. It would be a miracle if he got in visiting hours were over. She scratched her forehead in annoyance it was Imogen's bedtime, but Bobby was staring her down and he wouldn't relent. So she slipped on her shoes, tucked Immy into her carseat and humoured her husband.

* * *

Alex was right, they couldn't get in to see Declan. They were redirected to the administrative offices to a woman in a polka dot blouse and grey slacks. She had a very serious slant to her brow. She sat them down and gravely stated,

"Declan Gage died on Monday." _**2 days ago.**_

Bobby tossed his head back and forth and clasped his hands around the arm of the chair in an effort not to react vocally to the news.

"What happened?" Alex asked quietly gripping the handle of the infant bucket seat.

"We tried to contact next of kin." The woman flipped through a sheaf of papers "A Mr. Robert Goren." her eyes narrowed. "Oh, that's you." she realized, "But we were unable to make contact. Mr. Gage had a heart attack after the evening meal on Monday. We made every effort to revive him but he was pronounced dead shortly after the first signs of distress."

"I'd like to see him." Bobby's voice could grate cheese, his fixed stare could see through walls, his muscles were so rigid they were titanium and to Alex her hand on his bicep felt small, inadequate and irrelevant.

"Per protocol the body was sent to the county medical examiner. I can give you that information."


	29. Chapter 29

Mike Logan had a full roster of cases and a waiting list of potentials.

Life on the other side of the badge was good.

Making his own rules was better.

"Mike, I'm goin'"

"Okay Louie tomorrow." he yelled from his office.

There was no formality in his business, just a bunch of good guys doing good work. This was where he'd been since 11 months after quitting the force. And guys like Louie, they were who he'd been with. Ex-coppers, ex-military, ex-fed people with endless experience and mental resources that were either retired from, fed up with or had run afoul of the state. In other words kindred spirits.

He tidied up his desk. They were doing the law enforcement work that the system didn't want or acknowledge. Mike Logan had buddies everywhere especially at the 2-7 and they routinely kicked him cases that didn't meet the department purview. But most of the dough keeping them afloat came from spouses done wrong and corporate jobs. This was the law Logan style. Protocol, promotions and preferential treatment? Leave that crap to the NYPD.

"Mike, Sandy Muleteer is calling back in 25. Can you do the briefing?" That piped into his office via intercom from Rhonda his gal Friday. He smirked he'd always wanted a gal Friday, she was married but she was easy on the eyes.

"No problem you wrap it up and head home."

Mike had been thinking a lot about the past lately. Blame _her_ for that.

He had never quite fit anywhere until now. He was cocky, brash and a little too willing to flip off his superiors. He was better without superiors. His ass had been bounced from more squad rooms, captain's offices, and DA's meetings than he cared to count. Major Case had been his pinnacle, Staten Island his depths and his big mouth, well that was his Waterloo. He didn't have any illusions about who he was. And he pretty much barrelled through life with a 'take me or leave me' smirk. Mike had tools (a whole arsenal) that he used to suppress his natural seething anger and most days he barely contained his indignation. In his heart he was a beat cop, from a broken home with an overdeveloped sense of justice.

Mike felt mildly blessed that he'd found his calling and lived it for over 2 decades but he felt equally blessed to have gotten out. Like another detective he also could have gone either way. But in his case either way meant juvi for petty crime or a mentorship program that turned budding young thugs into cadets and marines. He'd chosen the way of his dad, the way of the cop. It had saved him. And on the job people like Brisco had made it worth getting up in the morning, but he'd always struggled with the rules of engagement. Why the hell should he pull any punches? Soft talk a molester or a murderer? Forget it. He was better off without a badge.

Now that he was his own boss he was busy, busy, busy.

Busy doing the things he wanted to do (for the most part) not jumping through hoops and following some privileged agenda.

Still he wasn't so busy that he missed watching his former colleagues Goren and Eames and their battle with that psycho Wallace all over the news. Who hadn't been watching? They were must see TV. He'd felt a pang for her, Alex, as that tear crawled down her cheek and that vulture Yancy crowed and postured beside her. Mike had experienced enough real pain to know it when he saw it. He'd actually moved closer to the screen planted himself on his not-so-sturdy coffee table and looked so closely that she had blurred. But he hadn't reached out because he was done with that life. There was no malice he was just _really done_. It had taken him a long time to get past being a cop and he didn't want to go back.

But then _she_ had reached out to _him_. Eames. Alex.

**_No idiot, none of the above._**

**_Mrs. Goren. _**

**_You stick to Mrs. Goren._**

And he'd thought long and hard about that. He'd stared at the pink 2 by 4 slip of paper with her name and number and a brief messy note that said 'please call' and wondered what she might need from him.

They'd had a thing.

A secret thing.

Years ago.

It'd been very short lived and very hot at the time. All the while Mike had known he was a stand in, a substitute, but he'd never had a problem with that. **_Hey, if an itch needs scratching_**. He didn't think _the man_ knew. The man. The big man. Her big glowering space cadet partner (at least not at the time). If Goren had known Mike figured he'd have met a fist (or more likely an elaborate, yet surprisingly simple, psychological defeat) Goren loved his mind games. But he'd never gotten into it with Goren about anything, much less Eames, so he must not have known.

Despite his irreverence (despite stupping his partner) Mike Logan had always liked Robert Goren. Goren was both strange and effective. He understood people. All those quirks had a way of working up under your skin and soon you were scratching and pacing and confessing. If nothing else Mike Logan could appreciate a fellow irritant and that was the way he saw Goren as a bit out there, vibrating on another level and humouring everyone that wasn't quite there with him.

They were about as different as two guys could be.

They'd never been friends, but they'd had the job, the brotherhood. They didn't need to be friends because they had a calling. They'd never had a beer and yet they'd take a bullet for each other. That was what Mike had liked about being a cop, it was about piecing it together, about _coming through_ not about paperwork or bullshit platitudes or empty promises.

But he could write a novel on what he hated about being a cop, and so he wasn't one anymore.

Good riddance he said. **_Kiss my ass Chief of D's and the rest of you lazy judgemental bureaucrats._**

But he digressed. When they'd had their thing, Mike and Alex, it had been a perfect storm. He figured looking back that it wouldn't have happened at any other time or under any other circumstance. He'd been on a really disaffected, dangerous path. They'd both been reeling. They'd both been less innocent and a lot betrayed, and that was saying something because Mike liked to think he'd been born smoking a stogey and talking trash. But he'd known after Holly that he wasn't. Even with everything he'd been through he was still looking for love and connection and softness. It was the human condition. And he was _so_ human.

And he'd found that night (those 5 nights), that so was Alex.

Alex was different from him. She wasn't his type first of all. He liked 'em a little more buxom and a little less 'eat you for breakfast'. He'd tiptoed around her a bit because broads on the force were known for having brass ones and she looked mean, but she had surprised him. It was an act. On the inside she was soft and squishy and in the right frame of mind she was molten passion. **_And the Academy Award goes to: Alex Eames._** She hid everything behind that gait, that tongue and those ordinary outfits. Underneath she was all woman. He should know...

**That evening they left 1PP at the same time. It was complete coincidence. Then they walked separately (but only paces apart) to the subway and then they both hopped onto the E train. For a while they'd played it New York and kept their gazes fixed straight ahead, but as the passengers on their car thinned, all that purposeful ignoring had felt more and more foolish.**

**"You following me?" he broke the ice.**

**"Please. If anything you're the one looking for a home." she shot back because she was quick and brutal.**

**"Whoa." he said moving from metal pole to metal pole until he was standing over her. And he realized in that moment how tiny she was and how… cute. And looking down he got to thinking if _I was that tiny and that cute I would probably dice anyone that within arms reach too._ This job, their job didn't make allowances for size. "You got a mouth on you you know that?"**

**She just stared, bored a hole right between his eyes, through his skull and into his frontal lobe.**

**"Where you headed?" he tried for small talk even though he knew she lived in Queens like him. But they had never taken the train together.**

**"Home."**

**"Car in the shop?"**

**He could see her weighing up how much she wanted to say. He took it as a compliment that she was letting him see her indecision at all. Man did this woman have a poker face.**

**"No."**

**It was worse then pulling teeth. It was torture, standing in the grim light of a subway car having a conversation with yourself.**

**"Okay then, this is me." he gestured to the approaching platform, "I'll see you tomorrow." _But I probably won't talk to you again unless you're the last woman on earth._**

**And somehow he knew, that she knew, that he'd thought that because when he got off the train suddenly she popped out of her seat like she'd made a decision and slipped past the doors before they closed.**

**"Buy me a drink." she commanded coming up behind him.**

**"Seriously?" he looked at her, "Why?"**

**"Because Goren's an asshole and because you aren't."**

**"Honey, I'm an asshole." he said t****hen belly laughed.**

**And she laughed too because she believed him, but she didn't care. Logan was edgy. Logan was fun. **

**And he was judging her too, and when she laughed he immediately saw something in her that he liked and so they went and got that drink, and then another, and then another.**

**He kissed her later (much much much later) that night leaning against someone else's car - a '99 Buick LeSabre - with a little too much scotch rocks in his belly and the glow from the pub window on his back.**

**"Did I say you could do that?" she pulled back and flat outed. But the edge was off because she was three sheets to the wind herself.**

**Mike's lips quirked, "Why is Goren an asshole?"**

**"It's this…" she paused sizing him up and then seemed to decide her secret was safe here, "He just doesn't care."**

**"About?"**

**"Me." she pursed her lips to stop all emotion in it's tracks. She still couldn't believe Bobby had gone undercover and said nothing, that he'd dodged her calls and that she'd almost shot him. And suddenly Mike got it. He understood the tension he'd been seeing during those long days in the bullpen. Even more he understood why she was so angry and the spite that had compelled her onto this street with him at 2am.**

**"Oh he cares."**

**She cocked her head and looked up, her fog lifting just a little. "Why do you say that?"**

**"Because he has that look."**

**"What look?"**

**"Lost."**

**"Well I'm not running a pound or a shelter." And with that she charged forward and just about kissed his face off. And Logan found he liked her lips all soft and boozy. And his hands had found that she wasn't all that straight up and down. Then she pulled back just as abruptly.**

**"If you make me a conquest and then tell all your buds about this I'll hack off your junk and report you to IA. I hear the weather is great on Staten Island this time of year." she said with the gutter mouth he expected.**

**He huffed she was the most intense person he had ever met. He liked that. He felt oddly proud to be the object of her threats. "What buds? It's a lonely life." he kissed her again. "This is just for us." **

**"Good enough." she said and tried to take control of his mouth with hers, it was a battle ****royal right there on 64th street.**

**And then without anymore conversation she'd gone to his place and let him between her thighs.**

**By the morning she had disappeared.**

It happened 4 more times. Sometimes (just like that first night) they'd get a drink at his local, and then stumble up to his apartment. Other times she would just show up. He'd hear that tap tap tap on his front door and his cock would stand at attention. Each time it ended with him asleep and he never heard her slip out. The next day he would look for a hint of recognition over the water cooler, around the filing cabinet or once his heart had kicked up a notch when he'd walked into the kitchen to find her alone there. But nothing, she gave him nothing.

"Hey Mike." she said with only a cursory glance and went back to sipping her coffee. He hadn't been sure what to make of it. He was half thinking he'd concocted it. But no. He always smelled like he'd been inside a woman the morning after and he always found a used condom squished unappealingly between the sheets. One day (he remembered that day well) it must have been after the third time, he'd leaned in to ask her something about the Lunden case, the one they'd worked together years ago.

"Did Garrett actually manage to get his robe back?" He'd heard a rumour that the guy was practicing in the outer townships. He'd asked the question then stepped a bit too close and cupped her elbow in his palm. Weird, he had never done anything like that before, touched her at 1PP. In retrospect he knew why, something in him had wanted to go public. He was bursting with the masculine urge to claim her. He hadn't wanted a girlfriend. And he definitely wasn't boyfriend material. Best he could come up with was that it was hard to just fuck someone. Truly fuck, empty and mindless without a hope or a prayer or a future. That sly hand on her elbow was an overture but Alex'd been cool, she'd raised that captured arm to sweep her bangs out of her eyes, and then turned away.

"No. No way." she shook her head, "I heard he put a gun in his mouth."

Goren was there and watching. Goren was a professional people watcher. A professional body reader and they'd both seen his darting eyes - from her to him to her to him to her. Mike could only hope he didn't look as guilty as he felt. At that time the big guy, Goren, was a pretty miserable sight, all puffy and self loathing and reeking of sadness. Honestly Mike didn't know what Alex saw in him but in that instant Goren changed. Watching Mike Logan touch his partner, speculating about them, wondering if they were up to something there was an immediate quickening and a vicious light in his eye. He'd given Mike a look that had lacerated him. Mike had felt that spot burning for the rest of the day.

_**Yeah right. He doesn't care. What a joke.**_

* * *

Presently imagine his surprise when Alex followed up her first call with a second. Six years and several crises had passed between them and their fling and suddenly two calls inside 24hours. Mike almost didn't believe it.

"It's Alex. Alex Eames."

"Don't you mean Goren?" He'd asked smoothly because he was still a cocksure SOB.

"Yeah." he could hear her smile, "Just working around your Alzheimer's."

He sighed, "Still a smart ass I see." He paused. "What can I do for you?"

"I need to see you, I need your help."

"Goren?"

"He needs your help too, but I'm coming alone." She said cryptically. "Tomorrow at 10am work for you?"

"11:30 and you got a deal."

* * *

She was going to see Mike alone. It would be easier.

The truth was that Bobby had gone into a tailspin since the news about Declan and like a mad scientist he was alternating between his puzzles and great fits of emotion. Alex'd seen him grieve before but she'd never lived in the same house as his grief. It was an entity.

Declan had been murdered. Potassium Chloride. No one would ever accuse Nicole of being original. Why discard a perfectly good modus operandi. It had been an almost sickening bit of deja vu, the two of them Bobby and Alex (and now Immy, she was never left behind, no matter how potentially scarring the excursion) in a medical examiner's office, minus Rodgers of course. The county examiner in this case was Dr. Wand. He had already cleared Declan off his books, he'd submitted his findings and was preparing to ship the corpse to Greenfield Memorial Gardens per Declan's in-depth specifications.

His findings? Death by fatal heart attack. It took a good deal of coaxing for the doctor to be persuaded to perform a re-examination. And a herculean effort to get him to let Bobby actually see the body, and do a physical assessment. It was a little bit sad and a whole lot sickening to Alex to see how old and wasted Declan looked so she had stayed in the waiting room.

In the end the injection point had been there only obscured by lividity (and probably the doctors preconceptions about a crazy old convict). And then it had been a further battle to get the ME to admit error publicly, retract his findings and attribute death to that undetectable chemical foe.

Being right about the poison was no consolation.

Bobby was devastated.

Alex held him that night like a baby. He gave her the weight of his body and unrelenting mind. His need for solace was bottomless and she accepted the challenge, pouring heaps of herself into a void she couldn't fill. He hadn't cried. She figured he was all cried out. She kissed his forehead and whispered soft words of reassurance.

At one point he said "Will it really be okay?" In that she heard the kind of desolation that Nicole wanted. He was starting to view himself as alone. "Will anything ever be okay again?"

"Oh honey." she said stroking his hair kissing his temple, the heft of his torso pressing her into the mattress, his head on her bosom. Alex hated every second of his pain but loved every minute of his surrender. As she held him she thought of so many things: of how she'd pined for this kind connection for so long, of how maybe the world was a better place without the Gages, of how Bobby didn't need more loss and of how she so wished he didn't have to hurt. "It will be fine. The world will level itself out. She can't do this to people and not be punished, she just can't."

There was steel in her voice.


	30. Chapter 30

Alex parallel parked in front of Mike's office in Flushing.

She looked up at the low rise, it was a nice clean gentrified neighbourhood in Queens. The building wasn't more then 4 or 5 years old by the looks. **_Infill_** she thought, the surrounding neighbourhood was considerably older. The street out front was wide and busy without being congested which was always nice in New York. But the kicker was the gold and navy blue wooden banner on blonde brick proclaiming Logan and Associates. That, Alex thought, was a slice of the American dream. _**Good for you Mike**_.

She hadn't told Bobby where she was going exactly. Of course he knew she wanted to involve Mike and of course neither of them went anywhere anymore without accounting for their movements, but she had managed to slip out under the guise of running errands. The old groceries, gas and banking excuse. Imogen was strapped into the back seat of the Honda.

When Mike saw her from his office window he did a double take. Was that really her? God she was different. Her insides were on the outside. All that light and warmth and femininity she'd been hiding was out there for all to see.

BAM!

She was androgynous no more.

He wasn't carrying a torch for her. He wasn't. Really. They hadn't spoken in years. She belonged to _him_ now. She'd always wanted to belong to _him_, even when Mike had been moving inside of her she'd closed her eyes and moaned softly and he'd known she was imagining Goren.

He watched as she leaned into the car to get something displaying her ass in all it's glory. Cream cigarette pants, a floaty touchable blouse and high heels. The Alex he'd known had always liked heels but the utilitarian type, basic chunky black platforms that had screamed 'just get me up to eye level'. Now they were sleek and sharp and they matched her outfit, hovering just on the cusp of stiletto. Where were the boring dark colours? Today she looked like a scoop of real vanilla ice cream. Her hair, spun gold and cascading chaotically from her head. What had happened to that thin, whip straight, caramel coloured do? The one that lived in her eyes like a yorkshire terrier's?

She looked like money.

**_Had she come into money?_**

Well he supposed she was NYPD elite now, and Goren well Goren was being worshipped on the altar of the FBI. One of Mike's buddies had told him all about that new job, professor Goren on the dias. So they probably had more then two coins to rub together.

Then he saw what she'd been reaching for. A baby. Her baby. _Goren's baby_. The dark haired little imp wrapped around her mother as she closed the car door with a thud. He straightened up and moved away from the glass anticipating her approach.

"Mike." she said warmly when they were face to face.

"Alex." he smiled, he leaned in and kissed her cheek and he found she smelled as good as she looked. Alex startled a bit at the affection but this wasn't 1PP, this was the way civilians related to each other. Besides she supposed she _had_ missed him in a way. Mike had a very reassuring energy, calm confident and competent. He looked her up and down "You clean up good."

She rolled her eyes at that and gestured to her daughter "This is…"

He cut her off "Immy." he reached out and touched the child's cheek with a couple of fingers "Baby you're a star." he smiled at the little girl and she smiled right back and then buried her face in her mother's neck. "She looks like Goren." he murmured.

"Tell me about it." Alex nodded "Can we talk in private?" she said abruptly then decided she hadn't invested enough in the niceties. "Nice offices you got here by the way." She glanced around. The place was open concept, one room and you could see up into the rafters. There were a few offices with closing doors around the perimetre but that was it.

"Thanks." he led them through the room (which was full of guys) on a long corridor created by desks, and then past a chestnut haired middle aged woman who couldn't take her eyes off them.

"Get it back in your mouth Rhonda. She's not a celebrity, her kid was snatched."

"Shut up Mike." the woman didn't miss a beat. And he flicked a thumb at her as if to say to Alex _**can you believe this chick**_.

"Nice and professional I see." Alex snarked once the door to his office was shut.

He laughed in that deep earthy way he had and said "I don't want anyone to have a thought they don't express."

"Okay then." She took him up on that advice "You're looking good. Married yet?"

He shook his head "My heart belongs to you."

"Ugh, and still a flirt." She set Immy down on the leather love seat then sank into a chair across from the desk flipping one leg casually across the other. Mike did look good. He was trim and silvery grey and he had an air about him, age made him dignified. He wasn't doing the jacket and tie thing anymore, but looked smart in slacks and a grey dress shirt.

"What can I do for you doll?" he sat on the edge of the desk above her and gave a small grin playing up the flirtation.

Alex didn't start off slow, "Wallace is back, she's lost it and she has me in her sights."

His face sobered. "How do you know…"

"Day before yesterday we found out that she killed Declan Gage."

"Gage…" he thought for a moment then the light of recognition dawned in his eyes "Gage the criminal profiler and…"

"And the closest thing Bobby has ever had to a father." She sighed, "He's wrecked."

"Wasn't his daughter the one that…"

She nodded cutting him off again "My feelings about a Gage-free planet are mixed at best. But Bobby…" the sadness was in her words, the furrow of her brow, the slant of her shoulders. It was clear that her husband's sadness was her own. Not for the first time Mike was jealous of that. Not so much that Goren had her, but that they had each other on such a transcendent level. He was jealous that they had so much more then a meeting of bodies.

"What makes you think she's gunning for you?"

"We know how she operates. We profiled her ages ago. She divides and conquers. She repeated that tactic on just about every case of hers we worked and now she's obsessed with us."

"To what ends. I mean she took your baby but she gave her back right?"

Alex smiled at his simplicity. Obviously he didn't have children and she supposed that was how it looked from the outside. From the inside it had been an absolute nightmare and Nicole hadn't_ given_ them anything. If they hadn't found Immy, alone in the woods, she would have died from lack of sustenance or worse. All Nicole had done was lure them out of the city and weakened them. Probably in preparation for her hit on Dec and God knew what other mayhem. "She didn't. She wants us weak and she wants Bobby alone."

"She wants him dead?"

"I don't think so." the words were slow and drawn out and he got her meaning immediately.

"She's got a thing for him."

"For about a decade now, when she's not busy being 'dead'"

"What does Goren have to say."

"He's not in the best place. He knows she means us harm he's been profiling her assisting the police search but I don't think he's considered the endgame."

"He has a blindspot."

"Something like that."

"So what? He's going to let this psycho toy with you, put a hit out on you?" He huffed. **_Some protector_**. If he had a woman like this he would do anything for her.

"Mike." she said short and sharp to stop him from going down that road. "I can take care of myself. Both of you boys forget I'm the one that still has a badge and legally carries a gun everywhere." she shook her head. "I need you to find Wallace."

"The state of New York is looking for Wallace kid." he said with all his irreverence, "What makes you think I can find her?"

"Mike we're cops, were cops, we know how it goes." She gave a wan smile "They'll look for her everyday from 9 to 5, with about as much interest and initiative as a paper weight. Once she crosses county or state lines the hunt will get bogged down in jurisdictional issues. The fed are involved but once we found Imogen their contact with us lessened. This thing is _going_ to go cold, and then one day they're going to find me face down floating in a creek somewhere."

He looked at her hard and grim. His gut spasmed at her dark imagery. But she kept talking.

"Bobby and I are hamstrung. We have a life that we need to keep going. I go back to the 3-4 in 4 days and he puts in 10 hour days at the Newark office. And we have this little troublemaker," her voice softened immediately she glanced at Imogen who was trying to grab a stapler off of the desk, then leaned forward and pushed it out of reach. "This little girl alone is a full time job. She needs consistency we can't be detectives. We have ideas, we have leads, but we can't chase them down."

He nodded slowly, "Whaddya got?"

"Bobby and I think she'll stay in the tri-state area until this is over. New York, Connecticut and New Jersey. We think she has an accomplice. And we think it's a young caucasian male."

Mike raised his eyebrows.

"Wallace swings either way," Alex explained "but this time she has alluded to, it's a riddle thing," She moved her head in irritation, she hated the games, "a disaffected young man. Declan was in an all male population at Mid-Hudson Psychiatric so a man would have fit in more easily. She sent us flowers the other day and the delivery guy was a male approx 5'10 150. We didn't think about the accomplice angle until we read the card and by then he was long gone. Bobby didn't see his face, huge bouquet," she gestured widely, "but he saw his frame. We tracked the flower company no one like that on delivery staff."

"I thought Wallace was dead." Mike crossed his arms, eyebrows knitted together "You sure it's her?"

"As sure as we can be. She talked to Bobby before the shit hit the fan. She went to his work. And she's been taunting us with videos and phone calls and notes for weeks now." She told him the whole story as she knew it, Tamara, the dead neighbours, the twin theory, the fictional family, the county clerks office, the taunts and teasing, the contact and Wallace's last known location. Like a class act he pulled out a digital recorder and got the whole thing on tape.

"So she talked to Goren, in person." he sat back his mind working. "So he knew from the start that she was coming for you."

"Well he couldn't have known this. This is Hollywood stuff blowing up our daycare. She really went all out."

"She's a stone cold killer Alex. He might'a connected the dots."

"And what?" she got her back up "And done what? Taken us and ran?" Alex was still mad at Bobby for this exact issue, but rule number one was no dissention in the ranks. She wasn't going to show doubt or weakness in front of Logan.

"Looks like he isn't the only one with a blindspot." Mike quipped.

"Look, I don't need a psychoanalyst. I need a friend and a good PI. Can you do it?"

"Well we can take it on, shuffle some things to make room but…" he ticked off on his fingers "Hours, manpower I'd like to do it pro bono but I think you'll need a lot of guys and my good looks don't pay the bills, trust me I've tried." His grin was pure lechery.

She snorted, "No but this room is getting really tight, with your head and all."

"Very funny."

"No" she sobered "We'll pay you."

"You good for it? I'll give you the friends and family plan." he smiled.

They actually weren't good for it. They were quickly reaching levels of financial discomfort, but they had to figure something out. Something had to give. This was life. Would it have been any different if one of them gotten ill or had an accident (knock on wood it never happened). The increased home security, private eye, vacation escape it was equivalent to large hospital bill like the ones Bobby had incurred caring for his mom. The one she had helped pay off so they could start their lives together fresh and free and clear. They were in this together. His debt was hers, his joy and pain were hers.

"I appreciate that Mike." she smiled at him softly and with such warmth that he felt an inappropriate stirring in his heart, in his pants. She was so different, sexy, she understood her personal power now, not just as a cop but as a woman.

"Ditch that schmuck and run away with me." he teased.

She waggled a finger at him, "You are too much Michael Logan."

"That's what sister Theresa used to say to me." they both laughed.

"There's something else," she said quietly after a minute looking at the recorder "Off the record." He switched it off. "Bobby doesn't know about…"

"He doesn't know we were hot and heavy."

She looked down at her lap then up tossing back her hair. "That's one way of putting it."

"How would you put it?"

"I wouldn't." She said sharply. "It was 6 years ago."

"And yet you brought it up."

"We'll be seeing each other, probably a lot. He suspected back then and he's not stupid. Don't push his buttons. Don't mention it. He doesn't have degrees right now Mike. He's either checked out or all in. He'll come out swinging."

"Is that a threat?"

"A friendly warning." She looked at him, from his wing tips up to his face and he shifted a little under her slow bold gaze. "When can you start?"


	31. Chapter 31

She had told Mike she didn't need a psychoanalyst, Bobby begged to differ.

"I want to see if Gyson will make a house call." He said as they lay in bed that night, he'd thought long about it and decided the likelihood of getting Alex to the psychiatrist's office in midtown was low.

"I'm fine Bobby."

"We're both about as far from fine as people can get."

He was right. They were making a go of living. Doing all the things that two middle aged, family aligned humans did: making meals, filling the gas tank and paying bills all the while with an anvil on a fraying rope swaying above them. It was all well and good to come back home but until the threat was gone this wasn't authentic living, it was limbo.

"What is that shrink supposed to do for me? Does she know where Wallace is? Will she kill her?" she snapped a little tired of all of it, but especially his new (new-agey) faith in psycho science. _She_ was taking care of them. _She_ had someone on the case. _She_ was doing the things she needed to do to achieve the tangible serenity she needed. For the last 15 hours she'd been filtering Mike information and he'd been texting his leads.

Alex was impressed. When Mike Logan took a case he didn't play around. The commitment meant something. He was way more motivated and effective then she ever could have hoped. One of his 'guys' was an ex-guard at Rikers and incidentally part of the union that governed all prisons (and psychiatric facilities for the criminally insane) in New York State. He'd used his connections to find out who had been on duty in the cafeteria at the time Declan had had his episode and from them what inmates were were at his table, table C. Mike had texted Alex the names of 10 inmates that the guard on duty thought were good for it. She had run them through the system and had a dossier on each one complete with their crimes and their known associates by lunch.

The only thing that was dampening her pleasure at the sleuthing was the fact that Alex hadn't said anything to Bobby. All day she had kept her lips sealed about this flurry of Nicole related activity and it was gnawing at her insides. She'd avoided being in the same room with him because she couldn't lie to him in the light of day, he knew all her tells. And now here in the dark she felt horrible. Their bed was a sacred place. Lying here in silence it felt like she was betraying her marriage vows.

She rolled over onto her side, facing away from him, she looked at the glow of the city as it passed through the slats of the vertical blinds and risked the truth. "I went to see Mike today."

"Mike?" He paused because to him this was a radical topic shift. "Mike Logan?"

"Yeah." the single word was muffled in her pillow. She felt the bed shift and dip as his weight compressed and displaced the coils beneath them and then the bedside lamp clicked on - darkness no more.

"You did what?" he looked at her in all the harsh blink inducing light.

"I went to see Mike Logan." she repeated still showing him only her back. He was intimidating when his indignation was righteous, so she cowardly avoided it. "I told you I wanted to."

"Yeah you told me that 4 days ago and never mentioned it again. You didn't say a word all day today." She felt his large warm hand on the bare flesh of her shoulder and he impelled her onto her back.

"Well there's no time like the present." She said softly.

"You didn't want me to come." He stated.

"I thought I'd spare you. You've had it rough the last couple of days. I was just in his office retelling our tale."

He stared down at her and she saw something there in his eyes. He sat with a cornflower blue bed sheet over his lap and his broad, bare fuzzy chest was the breadth of a football field. Only now he was wearing a look, a look he'd turned on hundreds of perps, but never her: suspicion.

"I - I would have liked to come." he said with practiced calm.

"Sorry." she said, but in that flip way.

"How is Mike?" he asked still staring down at her hard.

"Good. _Very_ good."

"Very?"

"Well he's the same. The business is doing well by the looks of it." **_He's s__till attractive and still a die hard flirt. "_**You know Mike."

"Not as well as you." he said and she panned his face for cloaked meaning but he was playing it very cool.

"I asked him to find Nicole."

"You what?!"

"I thought we agreed that we would."

"You're putting a lot of force behind a 10 syllable conversation we had days ago, in another country."

"I thought it was what we both wanted." she said again sitting up now wrapping thin arms around bent legs. She angled her head. "We need help and we need someone we can trust and we need someone good, Mike fits the criteria."

"What did he say?"

"He just asked for the background and I gave it to him. I hired him." Her voice caught on the word hired.

And then he was out of bed and pacing. "We didn't discuss the cost and the…"

"You want to wait because of money?" She was aghast "Are you serious, we're sitting ducks our daughter is a sitting duck and you want to do a spreadsheet." Sometimes Bobby really pissed her off. Well right. Of course. This wasn't his mom or his car, he'd let money run through his fingers like water for those things, this was only the safety of his _wife_ and _child_. She was livid.

She sprung up out of the bed to get away from him.

She only heard his words.

She should have invested a moment or two in deciphering his message.

But she couldn't even give him second. She was comfortable in her preconceptions thank you very much, and anger was not a generous emotion. And man was she angry. Suddenly it rocketed though her red and blinding. Every moment that passed saw her angrier and angrier. She'd lied, she wasn't over it. Her mind went on a dark journey, one were Bobby was the ogre and he put everything before their family. She had promised she wouldn't bring up his betrayal with Nicole in every fight and here she was about to bring it up the second they'd entered the ring.

"I didn't mean it like that, I meant I wanted to have a say."

"Well I want Mike to do this."

"You want Mike." he jeered and this time she heard it, his innuendo.

"I want him to run this case." she annunciated because she wasn't even going to dignify that with a response. "I want someone outside the system that can play dirtier and pull favours."

"Your ex-boyfriend?"

"OKAY, okay! Enough of this innuendo. Today was the first time I'd seen Mike Logan in 6 years." She glanced at the bassinet at the foot of their bed, a small arm came up then disappeared. Alex still hadn't managed to put Imogen in her own bedroom.

"But you don't deny there was something."

"I am a grown woman with a past. I mooned over you sure, but you I also got laid while I waited." That knocked him back on his heels. "Uh huh, did you think it was just Joe?" Her laugh was acid "There was Mike but also Peter and Mark and Justin…"

He wanted to slap hands over his ears and let lose a string of la la la la las. Instead he shook his head and secreted sarcasm, "Thanks for that." He'd always thought as much about Mike and Alex, but he had never known for sure. It was hard to think of Alex as anything but his. Her revelation itched and burned. He wrinkled and rubbed the skin of his face with his palms moving them over and over.

His feelings about Logan were nuanced. He neither loved nor hated the man. He had a qualified respect for him. He had seen Logan make some great calls professionally. And Mike had a touch of the everyman in him that Bobby had never been able to unearth in himself. **_Because I'm not common_** he thought meanly and a titch jealously. Bobby had been on the receiving end of both Logan's assistance and his ire and it was hard to say which he preferred actually. Bobby had enjoyed playing him. Logan was a hot head, and his actions were fuelled by his moral compass more then anyone Bobby had ever met. Bobby knew that that was a very subjective and malleable code to live by. In the past it had made Mike a prime candidate for manipulation. **_I bet I can still play him_**.

Alex watched her husband. She didn't like that look. She suddenly felt the need to issue a warning to him as well. "He is hel-ping us." She spoke in a slow exaggerated manner as though to a child. "Do not get into it with him."

"You're defending him now?!" Bobby looked hurt "Against me? We're paying him. I don't have to be his pal."

"I thought you liked Logan!" she yelled then regulated her voice looking over at the bassinet.

"Yeah as a co-worker not if he's trying to score with my wife."

"Sco…" she shook her head in exasperation. "You're mental!"

"So they say." he roared.

"You're going to wake the baby." Her voice was a stage whisper. "I'm not even going to talk about this anymore. Mike is getting results and that's good enough for me."

"This Wallace thing isn't just your fight. You can't control the flow of information because you used to bang the PI." Now it was her time to take a step back. "I think I need to talk to Logan."

"Listen to me. You're emotional." She held up a placating hand. "This is just loss and PTSD talking. You should talk to Gyson…"

"Oh she's useful to the nutcase but not the cynic. Give me a break." his voice got loud again.

"I'm going to sleep on the couch and let cooler heads prevail in the morning." She made to walk past him.

"Distancing so soon." he grabbed her upper arm. "I don't think so."

"Let me go." The words were emitted from between clenched teeth. He did exactly the opposite. A second steel band seized her other bicep. "Do you have a death wish." She barked.

"Are you finished pretending you aren't angry about what I did." He shook her a little with the force of his conviction. This was all because he hadn't told her about Nicole.

"At least you admit you did something."

"I knew it." He crowed and she wobbled again in his grasp "I _knew_ it!"

"Well good Mr. Know-It-All, let that keep you warm tonight." she pulled against him but in a sudden display of strength she hadn't expected he spun her and tossed her and with about as much weight as a wafer and she floated down to the bed then bounced a mass of limbs and (obscene) litanies. Then he dropped down atop her catching one lean bare leg awkwardly twisted between his.

Alex had a flash of fearful discomfort. He was so much bigger then her. And his bones and fat and muscle and personality ground her down more deeply then it ever had because she was passive under him. It was something she'd never been before, she just accepted it. And like a watery submersion, the absence of kicking and flailing was disturbing to both of them.

"What's wrong?" he asked she was so calm, so docile.

"You put me here." she replied. It was an uncomfortable metaphor that wasn't lost on him in the erie silence.

"Don't punish me Alex."

"I wasn't trying to." her voice was barely a whisper.

"Yes. You were."

"Not consciously."

"No one will ever love you the way I do."

"Your love hurts me."

Physically and emotionally, her leg was going numb now.

"What can I do?" he plead.

"Get off me." It was cold. He felt a shiver raise his skin. Imagine if he lost her. If all she could muster one day was apathy. It would kill him. He respected her wishes and rolled away.

She didn't leave. They lay in silence.

"We'll do it your way." he said once it was dark again. "We'll let Mike try and find Nicole."

He said because he wanted them to be on the same side.

He said it because it was all she wanted to hear from him tonight.


	32. Chapter 32

**A/N: Sorry all traveling again, this has been the most travellingest (word? not a word? officially my own *new* word) year I've had in quite some time. I'd have liked to keep the story going at a good pace but sometimes life gets in the way. **

* * *

And a new day dawned.

Alex had woken quietly that morning. A calm initiation to a fresh day. Eyes closed, she got to live in the stillness of her form for a few precious moments before reality intruded. When it did, it came with a rush of sadness. The melancholy spread until it was heavy in her limbs. She remembered their fight and her harsh words and then her fears and her worries.

It was awful the morning after an unresolved night before. There in that bed with the weight of the world pushing down on her small body she felt so alone. She sank even deeper into the bed thinking of facing a whole day without Bobby. Her friend. He was her best friend and _she needed him so_ right now. A small soft sigh escaped her lips. They were supposed to go to the Lonnsdale this morning for breakfast a small treasured bit of normalcy. And after that they had an appointment with each other to do nothing except lazy the day away together. Now she supposed they wouldn't be talking. It was amazing how much that thought hurt. Loneliness was always sharpest inside a marriage.

She slowly opened her eyes, but she didn't spring up or flip fitfully or even move to empty her bladder instead she just lay there and looked at Bobby in the soft morning light. The true him, unedited, unembelished by his words and all his distracting movements. He was on his side arms outstretched toward her. Half his face was mashed into the pillow the other half sagging with sleep. Her gaze traced the fine lines fanning from his eyes. She looked at his coarse wavy hair and the one complete curl at his ear that was growing faster then the rest. She looked at the mole on the ball of his shoulder and his toasted golden forearms then paler and milkier uppers. And she wondered objectively what made him so vital to her. He was just a man. He was just a man.

She tucked the blankets up around her neck, and kept eyes on him unwavering. Her mind wandered. She wondered who she might have been if she'd of ruthlessly cut him out of her life. And not because he'd kept the return of Satan a secret, rather if she'd done it years ago after one of his many slights. If she'd done it after Nelda or Leslie or one in the string of bimbos he'd called girlfriends. After Tates or after he'd blown her off for Carmel Ridge or after his undercover adventure or after one of at least 75 sleepless nights she'd had over the years because she'd known he was spiralling. **_No. No! _**She'd definitely have done it when he'd vanished for that year they weren't at Major Case. Offering her only phone calls on the long hard days. She imagined how she might have dispensed with him. Coldly. Viciously. She would have told him he wasn't worth it. That he was a liability. Then walked away and never spoken with him again. A tiny part wished she had. Just to hurt him the way he had hurt her (and still did) over and over and over.

But she hadn't.

She couldn't.

She wouldn't.

Ever.

To say she was confounded was an understatement.

To say she was conflicted a gross oversimplification.

To say she was in love fit just right.

Alexandra Goren (nee Eames) had managed to locate the one person on the planet whose life was destined to fishtail around and collide messily with hers. It was more then coincidence. She was cosmically tethered to Bobby. From the outside looking in everyone thought that she had been born to carry a badge, that being a cop was her calling, but it wasn't. It was a vehicle that the universe had used for her to meet him.

Even Bobby had marvelled at how he was an exceptional cop and yet not one at all. He had none of the thin blue line in him- none of obsession with brotherhood or the respect for hierarchy or the blue blood. And still even with his 'weaknesses' he had made it to 1PP and so had she on February 17, 2001. Meeting her had saved his life and meeting him had saved hers over and over and over.

She desperately wished lying there, gripping the cotton sheeting, that she hadn't been so harsh with him last night, but that feeling was nothing new. Their fights were like flash floods, passionate, intense and then over, but the damage, oh the damage. And to be fair the regrowth, because of the fights new things always sprang up, new canals and vegetation in places they'd never known existed. The great schisms lead to deep attachment, being constantly challenged made them constantly evolve.

Suddenly, from across the great divide of their King sized bed, she wanted nothing more then to be in his arms. She just wanted to _move on _from this, with no talk and no apologies. She scooted over and roused him a little then crawled inside his skin, pressing her cheek to his fuzzy chest and drawing his immensely heavy arms around her like a goose down duvet.

She felt him rumble low and sleepy in that echo chamber of a chest, but he didn't speak. He didn't even crack an eyelid. She nodded slowly just for the friction, just to feel those curly wires scrape her cheek and lips. She closed her eyes and filled her diaphragm with him. **_Ahhhhhh, the smell of Bobby_**. He tightened on her. Drawing her against his body. His breathe was hers, his abdomen distending as hers receded. One person. Hot and solid and clammy and human.

"No more fighting." she murmured into her dense fleshy cocoon, although she knew in her heart they'd be at it again in a few hours. They were both too tightly wound for peace right now.

"No more. Never again." he whispered echoing her false optimism and kissing her crown.

Silence.

Many moments later he murmured. "Tell me you love me."

Snug in his arms she had been waiting for this. She could set her watch to it. This happened every time. This insecurity worked past his lips at some point after every fight. At first it had baffled her. But then she had forced herself back to the encyclopaedic volumes she had in her head about him. Over the years Alex had listened raptly to the anecdotes of happiness and horror that were Bobby's life. She'd pieced together his psyche during this reconnaissance and she understood the why of him.

His pleas for love were about his childhood fears and the crumbs of affection he had chased his whole adult life. They were about his emotional abandonment when his father left and Frances slipped away. They were about his latch key life - unlocking door after door into dark empty houses and making do for himself. They were about grinding his mother's medication up into the breakfast he had made for her. They were about the fights with his brother, he said that Frank always managed to hit him right in the temple, the same place every time, with the cruel accuracy of youth. His pleas were about having two fathers both incapable of real love. All of these things and more made him worry so (every single day) about his fundamental lovability. Alex was the litmus of his humanity. And he held his breath every single time waiting for her verdict.

Alex didn't look up into his eyes because she had already looked into his soul. **_Does he really think I don't love him?_** No. He didn't think that, but his 7 year old's amygdala did. She was starting to understand Bobby on a level she had never dreamed and she wondered lying there against his heart what she could say to stem some of his irrational fears. The ones he couldn't seem to shake. The ones she knew he never would.

She edged up and used his ears as handles bringing him in even closer. Then she covered his face with a fluttering of soft warm kisses. She heard a puff of relief pass his lips as she did.

"I love you _so much_. Even when I hate you." She smiled around a kiss, "You're the one. You're it for me."

And then she was under him again and his hand slipped low and she moaned sweet and raspy and his worries (temporarily) scattered to the wind.

* * *

"I heard you Alex. I heard you creeping around." he railed.

"I wasn't creeping!" she volleyed back "I don't creep in my own house. I was doing a feeding."

"At 2am? She doesn't even wake up in the middle of the night anymore."

Let the fighting commence.

Alex looked away guiltily. He was right. She had woken that morning in the pre-dawn hours and slid smoothly out of bed. Immy had been sound asleep her diapered bum peaking up over the edge of her walled bed, a soft whistling passing her small lips with each breath. She was slumbering infant perfection. But that hadn't stopped Alex from reaching into that bassinet and scooping out 17 dosey pounds of baby flesh. Make no mistake Alex had done it because she had needed the comfort. She had freed her breast and slipped her nipple into her baby's mouth feeling an odd cocktail of shame and peace at the rolling rhythmic pull.

In the dark alone suddenly she could admit it to herself.

She had a problem.

Giving nourishment wasn't the problem. Giving love wasn't the problem. _Needing it _was. And Alex did need it. She needed to have that baby tucked against her like oxygen. It should feel life affirming and natural. But acknowledging her own desperation tainted it.

Still, right now, in the present, she felt the need to posture in front of Bobby. Maybe because he was so right. Maybe because he understood patterns and behaviour so well that he could evaluate her whole disposition from a twitch or a tick. It was hard living with someone so tuned in. It made a person defensive. She wanted to share her insecurities, her insomnia and her new uncomfortable mania with him. But they made her feel both weak and out of control two emotions Alexandra Goren couldn't abide by, especially in herself.

"Nothing is wrong with me." she insisted "I'm going to call Liz and have her babysit today so that I can get a few things done before work on Monday."

That shut him up. He raised his eyebrows.

And she returned a sharp look that said: **_Showed you_**.

Now she just needed to show herself.

* * *

She purposely scheduled her sister's arrival for many minutes after Bobby's departure. She had urged him to go and see his Mustang. Which also that meant - fingers crossed - that he was going to see Lewis as well. The vintage car was being housed in one of his unused garage spaces for the forseeable future. The rent was cheap and so was the occasional car care, BFF rates. **_An afternoon of beer and stories. Perfect._** Alex thought. The plan on Prospect Park West was for Liz to pick up Immy and go a few blocks over to Will's house. That way the baby would be in the loving care of family. Lots of family (and Alex could prove something to Bobby). Something about her mental stability and ability to engage in carefree mothering.

But there was a popular saying about the best laid plans…

**_What in the hell am I doing?_** Alex had a vivid gut splitting moment of fear right after her sister left.

Had she really let Imogen leave the house without her.

Alex felt her breath come quick and unsteady at the thought. Her hand gripped the front door handle like the only solid thing in a tornado. Panic! She recognized the intense early symptoms of her new disorder. **_Breathe Alex Breathe. _**Her hand shot out and flailed around inside her purse looking for her cellphone.

"Liz. Liz." She cried into the phone. "Bring her back. Please bring her back." She felt the sting of tears and then the wetness of them on her cheeks leaving desperate translucent polka dots all over her tank top. She wanted to claw her skin, she wanted to climb the walls, she wanted to die just so she wouldn't feel this stricken terror that was clogging her throat. "Bring her back please."

Alex waited the longest 5 minutes of her life before she heard them ascending the stairs, before they came into view, her sister holding her baby in a carrier. Alex tried to settle down, tried not to show Elizabeth how low she had fallen but she couldn't stop herself she was fairly dancing around on the landing waiting to have Imogen back in her arms.

"It's okay." Liz soothed, "It's okay. She's okay." Liz couldn't believe the woman before her, breathing heavily, crying, waving anxious hands toward the soft package strapped to her chest. This wasn't Alex. This wasn't her sister. "It's okay" Liz kept cooing even as she speed to the task of unstrapping and de-velcroing. Her own hands were shaking with urgency to _just get the baby loose_. And then she did. And how Alex hugged that little girl. The sweet peace, bliss even, that swept across her face. It was almost their Prospect Park reunion all over again. Liz's eyes were wide and when Alex came back into herself enough to take stock she knew that Bobby was right.

She needed help.


	33. Chapter 33

Doctor Paula Gyson didn't make house calls. She had VERY firm rules about temperature, tone and ambience. She had worked hard to craft an inoffensive environment conducive to discussion and introspection. She was a little bit anal actually (thank you Freud) about everything in the midtown townhouse she called her office, the height of the art, the recline of the chairs, the colours of the walls. It was all optimized for release and respite. She swated away suggestions to "take a session outside" like most people swated blue bottle house flies. _All_ of the sessions were inside.

But when Robert Goren (the man she still thought of as Detective Robert Goren but who was a detective no more) had called and asked her for a favour she found herself clearing her schedule and then climbing into her smart little BMW 3 series. Paula Gyson watched the news too. And this was the dark time she had prophesied. She was extremely gratified that he had sought her assistance again.

Through the peephole Alex saw a dark haired woman at her front door. A woman she had never met but was expecting. A woman that had helped her husband so much that he was a convert to therapy. When Alex opened she reluctantly concluded that Paula Gyson was as beautiful as the photographs. And when she walked into their apartment it was on a brisk vanilla scented breeze. Formal introductions were short. Alex felt the same quiet power radiating off of Paula Gyson that was so common in the professional observers she'd met over the years Olivet, Skoda, Huang. Just having her there felt good. This psychiatrist was a reassuring presence.

Which made_ him _right _again_.

**_Damn you Bobby._**

Alex soon realized exactly what made Paula Gyson feel so magnetic, she was a stranger to their life and their mess. She offered a treasured glimpse into the world they'd forgotten was still spinning. In anticipation of her arrival they'd run around for an hour thinking only about the banalities of hosting like: **_Should we vacuum? Should we ditch the sweats?_** (yes and yes). And now that she was here Alex got to size her up in that age old way of women, the bounce of her hair, the glint of her jewellery, the cut of her denim. It would seem that their therapy had begun to work before anyone uttered a word. In Gyson's presence all of their problems receded and for a few precious moments they were both firmly in the _here and now_.

"She's beautiful." Their guest murmured as she looked down on Imogen's dark profile and flushed cheek and stripy jersey romper, while simultaneously waving off tea or coffee but accepting a tall glass of icy water. The baby was in the kitchen. Paula Gyson didn't say a word or raise an eyebrow at the image of a child in a bassinet napping beside the running dishwasher. Bobby and Alex had thought of everything. They'd scheduled this therapeutic intervention so that it fell during their 2 hours of daily tranquility, their daughters nap. Then they'd manufactured a little white noise to keep their little one sleeping. And the kitchen? Well Imogen was in the kitchen because the kitchen was in sight, and _always in sight _was Alex's rule at the moment.

"Tell me the problem." Gyson said directly once they were all seated in the living room. She had masses of private presumptions just from the look of the room and the posture of it's occupants but she always wanted the problem as it was perceived by the client.

"Do you have a week?" Alex shot out glibly.

"No but I have a few hours." the psychiatrist countered with calm reason. Paula Gyson was already assessing this petite pretty blonde before her - she was flip, sarcastic and probably quite cynical - just for starters.

"I wasn't sure if we should call." Bobby admitted and at Gyson's quizzical brow added "We're having problems, but we also aren't past the danger."

She nodded briefly understanding, "There is a popular misconception that therapy is only beneficial retrospectively. That it is only for 'survivors', but some of the most helpful therapeutic relationships have occurred inside a crisis. It is literally a field called Crisis Intervention." She looked from man to woman, "The danger is that without help people behave reactively. The situation begins to control them which leads to greater feelings of stress and helplessness. Creating a plan of action and outlook, no matter how simple, can be quite effective for emotional and physical wellbeing."

"In that case we're glad you're here because we're being lead around by the nose." Alex stated in her blunt way.

"Let's start with your fears."

"Okay. My child, my life, our finances…" Alex launched into a laundry list that wasn't so ordinary.

Gyson considered that."You fear for your life, you fear for your child and you anticipate a return to work."

Alex nodded, a woeful trembling worked it's way through her skeleton until it shook the tips of her fingers, then her eyes got watery. And she tried to hide her very visceral reaction by picking red fluff from the wool toss cushion in her lap.

"Alex is having panic attacks." Bobby contributed softly, he knew how vulnerable his wife was (they both were) but seeing Alex struggle pained him so. "And she's focusing on Imogen… a little obsessively."

Paula Gyson took the water glass in her hand and took a slow sip. Then looked at Alex and said. "Your behaviour is normal." Alex felt relief so deeply and sharply at her words that a tear managed to escape her iron grip. Alex had always counted on her strength and her wits. She was the rock. It was horrible for her to feel this way, almost as if she were plummeting into madness (or rather being pushed to it). "It's not desired." The doctor continued "Constant fear is toxic, it stresses the body. But your response is definitely normal given the circumstances." She leaned forward, "I would like to help you cope. Coping mechanisms can be very effective tools." She gave her patient a soft look. "The fear response is physiological, experienced hormonally in the body there is an effective two pronged approach to combat them physical: breathing and exercise and mental: redirection. I'll get you started today but I think we could make great progress toward restoring your equilibrium during one on one sessions." she said the last bit while extracting in her small notebook from a slim red leather attaché. "I'm also going to prescribe Alprazolam - Xanax - to help with anxiety. Very low dosage and we'll tweak as needed."

Then all was silent but the scribbling of her ballpoint pen. " Any allergies? Addictions?" (No and no) "Are you pregnant?" she asked off hand as she scratched away. They looked at each other on a jolt recalling a recent lax attitude toward birth control.

"I -I don't think so." Alex stammered out. **_Nature wouldn't dare..._**

"Are you trying?" Gyson asked.

"No." They said in unison while both remembering a desperate tryst in a public restroom and another few oops' including this morning.

"This is contra-indicated for pregnant women." she tore off from her pad. "Don't fill it until you know, I made a note there for the pharmacist."

* * *

"Can we talk in practicalities?" Paula Gyson asked some moments later.

"What do you mean?" Alex asked.

"The most comforting and healthy things to consider at times like these are your future plans and safety." she briefly assessed the apartment. " Tell me what you've already done and then we can brainstorm going forward. The goal is to help you both to live as normally as possible."

"We had the apartment secured. It was swept for electronic devices. On the windows we installed new locks and a mechanism to prevent them from opening too widely. We have a new high tech alarm system."

"So home is a fortress." she nodded. "Are you going out as usual?"

"We've been trying to. We're doing our best not to hide." Bobby contributed.

"We hired a private investigator."

"Mike." his voice deepened. That was his tell.

"An old friend?" Gyson turned her hawkish gaze on him.

"Ex-cop." Alex explained.

"Ex-lover." Bobby shot out and Alex gasped and gave him a look that should have dissected his organs.

"I sense tension." The doctor understated mildly.

"Bobby is being irrationally jealous."

"Is Alex correct? Does his relationship with Alex make you jealous?" She turned to Bobby.

"I have always had mixed feeling about Mike. And then Alex went to him for help without mentioning it."

"I asked if his interaction with Alex makes you jealous."

"Yes." his voice was clipped and harsh and he slapped his knees, hard.

Alex felt the need to explain herself. "I wanted to act! I didn't want to get bogged down in a _mental battle _about money or anything else. We need to protect our daughter."

"What do you think of that Robert?"

"She's right," he conceded "I might have needed time to get my head around it. But she could have found a way to respect my reservations."

"Is he, this PI, an effective member of the team?"

"He was a good detective." Bobby reluctantly admitted.

Gyson turned on Alex, "Did you hire him to evoke a response from your husband?"

Her pause said it all. She hadn't thought she had, but now she was starting to re-evaluate the dark depths of her own subconscious. She bit her lip. "Maybe." She didn't look at Bobby she couldn't bear to see the light of victory in his eyes. But she should have looked, because there was no victorious glint only hurt, which carved a furrow on his brow.

"That hurts you Robert." This was another reason why Paula Gyson was here, to acknowledge the unacknowledged.

"Yes." And on that syllable Alex turned swiftly. She let her eyes flit over the corners of his face, it was true he was so hurt.

"Is it improving your outlook to know you've hired someone to look for Nicole Wallace?" the psychiatrist asked Alex.

And she nodded rapidly. Alex was steering her own fortunes again and it felt damn good. It was her only light these days. "Mike has started sending reports. It makes me feel safe." Her words felt like a body blow to Bobby. To him it was black and white. Another man was doing what he couldn't.

"And you Bobby?" Gyson felt the undercurrents.

"I'm not sure what he's done, he's been contacting Alex."

And Alex had her first epiphany sitting on their caramel coloured sofa. Bobby didn't share any of her feelings of safety or well being because she had left him out of the loop. Bobby was right again, she _was_ punishing him. Alex suddenly felt ashamed of her behaviour. Any pleasure she might have once gotten was hard to remember here sitting beside him feeling his sadness and his inadequacy. It was more then just this situation Alex could see that now. Bigger deeper issues were swirling around them, about their roles, about his masculinity, his ability to provide, about his _usefulness_. "I'll have Mike CC you."

"More then that" Gyson interjected "I think you should arrange a debriefing for the three of you. This situation is too serious for playing favourites or petty jealousies. Assuming they are petty." she pinned Alex in her sights.

"They're petty." Alex asserted, this much she could stand on. "I hadn't seen Mike in years. There is absolutely nothing between us." She looked over touched Bobby's arm and imploring him to see the truth of her statement.

"Do you believe her Robert?" It was important, crucial even, to air this. Their unity was where their strength lay.

"Yes." he didn't think Alex was messing around with Mike, but he did worry that stress and her desire for normalcy could push her in that direction.

"You paused." **_God this woman is relentless._** Bobby thought. Now he was starting to remember the most uncomfortable moments of their sessions.

"Did I?" he asked.

"Definitely. Do you worry about where it might go? Do you worry about another man filling a role you would like to play? Do you worry that Mike might actually find Wallace and usurp you in your wife's heart?"

"What?!" Alex burst giving a sardonic hollow laugh. "That is insane."

But the quiet from the other end of the couch was conspicuous. Then he said "Not exactly." But they were the two most measured words in the history of the english language.

"What exactly?" Gyson probed and Alex gaped.

"I don't know exactly what I feel, but it's negative."

"Negative and directed at Alex's relationship with Mike?"

"Yes." he bit out.

"I'll set up the meeting we'll see Mike tomorrow, together." Alex rushed out grabbing his hand her eyes cried **_you never told me this_**. "I'll show you everything he's sent me."

"Good. That sounds like progress." Paula Gyson seemed to tick a box on an invisible check list and then she heaved them all mentally forward. "What else?" The professional looked from husband to wife. "What other action might serve to strengthen your feeling of safety?" They looked at each other not sure if there was anything else. The professional edged them along with an anecdote.

"I had a client some years ago, a celebrity client, that was being stalked." She smiled as the both zeroed in, interest piqued. "No names, patient confidentiality. She and her 2 children were living under a cloud of media scrutiny and the relentless taunting of this faceless individual. She created a safe word for emails and phone conversations. She told all of her friends and family her safe word and every private communication ended with the word. Can I speak frankly?" she asked

"You get me more frank then this?" Alex mused off hand.

The woman smiled. "My client she didn't know her stalker but you know yours and whatever else this is, you are being stalked. Stalkers watch their prey they send them trinkets and gifts, they create a storm of fear and thereby obtain their compliance. Nicole Wallace is dangerous but she is also wanted. Maybe you have to play that to your advantage. I loved what you did with the media. It was brave and inspired. Keep up the pressure, keep up the public awareness."

Bobby had considered this privately and the psychiatrist's endorsement made it seem all the more sensible. Maybe Faith Yancy would like and another episode, and feeling a little sickly he could see it now: 'The Family Reunited!'

* * *

Later (about an hour later) they were all good and comfortable. Rigidly locked shoulders sagged, self-consciousness had fallen off the bone and some tongues got a little bit looser.

At one point Bobby looked at Alex pointedly as if to say **_tell her what's wrong with you_**.

Alex bristled at that. "My problem with him." She lobbied back. "are the secrets."

"Secrets? Care to elaborate?"

In a moment of inspired turnabout Alex looked pointedly at Bobby as if to say **_tell her what's wrong with you._**

"Wallace." He sighed "I assume you read the file." He didn't want to go into the details of their sordid past. "She came to me twice before she took Imogen."

"And you kept it to yourself." Gyson concluded without inflection.

He nodded shortly. He _so_ did not want to talk about this, if he could be staring down a lion or taking a bullet right now it would be preferable."She was supposed to be dead. The first time I saw her she was playing with my assumptions trying to make me question my sanity." he explained. "She never spoke, she virtually vanished. She left me a clue. But I…" he hesitated feeling exposed and judged both women staring at him but he had to admit this for Alex.

"But you?" Gyson prodded.

"But I half think I'm insane anyway. I walk around most days wondering when I'm going to wake up or get laced into a straight jacket." he laughed emptily looking down at his five square dull fingernails, it was the truth. "I was in shock."

Alex guffawed. Bobby looked at her so raw, and couldn't believe that she still doubted the truth.

Gyson zeroed in. "You don't believe him."

"He knew it was her. He was playing into her hands. He always falls in when Nicole comes calling. UST"

"UST?" They shrink asked for clarification though she was up to date on contemporary acronyms.

"Unresolved sexual tension."

"How long will I have to fight this idea that…"

"Until you die!" Alex shot crossing her legs and using the momentum of the action to turn away from him.

"See. This is what I deal with." Bobby plead for an ally.

"You are the only one that doesn't see the chemistry." Alex gave him a stony look. Then she turned to Paula Gyson "Look at the footage for yourself."

"I have." That brought them both up short and that shut down all future arguments. It wasn't just their reality any longer. "I've watched all of the interrogation footage on record featuring Nicole Wallace." And because she understood that her impartial input would be invaluable she waded in to this decade long tension. "My professional opinion is that you are dealing with a woman who uses her sexuality to manipulate others." She looked at Bobby, "From watching your interplay I concluded that you were fascinated and invigorated by her persona. But it was just that, a persona." She looked Bobby. "Were you aroused? Only you can truly answer that. You were certainly intimate. In both your physical positioning and in your dialogue." She'd measured, two inches. At his closest his lips had been two inches from those of a serial killer. She said as much.

"I was engaging her on her level." He explained for what seemed like the thousandth time and he wished he had never met _fucking_ Nicole Wallace. "I wasn't aroused."

"Okay." Paula Gyson looked at Alex. "If your husband is telling you something and insisting it is the truth. You have a choice, you can persist in your own agenda and torment both of you indefinitely or you can trust him and release the anger."

Alex felt her breath speed, partially because she didn't know if she could let it go, and even more because she didn't know what would fill the gaping hole once she had. Nicole was a crutch for both of them.

"Releasing the anger doesn't mean forgetting. To forget would be a superhuman feat. It means acknowledging the limitations of your perception and putting faith in your partner. You don't have to do it here and now. But if you decide to, let him know. He deserves that."

"Okay." Alex murmured.

"What else did you see in the video footage." Bobby couldn't restrain his curiosity. Nicole Wallace would forever be his greatest professional puzzle.

Gyson addressed him like a peer. "Wallace reads like an ABC of the DSM" They laughed and Alex rolled her eyes it was like a Mensa convention. "It was unlikely you ever saw her true personality. Within moments a colleague and I, had catalogued Borderline Personality Disorder, Hypersexualization and attachment disorder." Gyson paused to take a sip. "In the videos I saw you engaging in some mirroring, I also saw you pushing her boundaries. Both dangerous courses of action with an unstable subject. But it was also clear that she enjoyed being engaged by you. I believe she accepted you as a peer. And because she viewed you as an equal in intellect and in dysfunction she allowed you to make judgements, judgements about her mental health and her family dynamic. I found it fascinating that you foiled her consistently and she never once attempted to harm you. It was clear that she wanted you to live to play another day."

"She loves him." Alex finally voiced.

"She isn't capable of love." Bobby shot out.

"I would need to sit with her to make an official diagnosis on that." From her place on their Eames chair Gyson tucked a leg beneath her. "but I believe Wallace is capable of love. She does appear to feel and act on those feelings. It doesn't seem that her psychopathy is complete there are gaps. You fit into one Robert. The child, Gwen, another. Does she love you? I'm not certain, is she infatuated without a doubt."

"I think…" Alex started then stopped not sure she wanted make theories into real foes by having them validated by a professional. But she did anyway. "I think Nicole is trying to isolate Bobby to win him."

"That is a valid theory especially after Declan Gage." Gyson nodded.

But Bobby shook his head. "We got Imogen back. I think this is about power and fear."

"Since I'm the one she'll murder next I win." Alex snapped. "Now I remember why I went to Mike."

Gyson saw it for what it was. This husband refused to legitimize his wife's fears, and so she retaliated. She inflicted an equal amount of pain by reminding him of an ex-lover. Tit for tat, it wasn't only trademark Wallace. "Hold on. Let's delve deeper. Your wife is telling you she feels a real threat to her life and you refuse to believe the worst of a killer."

"I'm not doing that." He said but he looked confused.

"You look confused. You're considering it. You're confronting your own mental block." She looked at him "This is about self worth Robert. Your esteem. Consider this. Consider that all of this misery, all of this pain is driven by Nicole Wallace and her obsession with you. Consider both your innocence and your culpability in that. Now own it. Believe it."

* * *

"Put your hand here." Paula Gyson moved behind Alex and placed a hand on her abdomen, the psychiatrist was leaving but first she carved out a few parting moments to teach Alex a breathing technique, something (non-medicinal) to beat back panic when it rose up. "And your other hand here." she placed Alex's other hand on her chest. "Sigh ever so slightly to release trapped breath. Good." Paula Gyson smiled reassuringly. "Now in through the nose, and I want to see your stomach fill. Right, and out through the mouth slowly and I want to see your stomach flatten."

"Or as close to flat as I can get it right?" the blonde woman joked self consciously.

"Oh stop. You are in great shape." The Psychiatrist complimented the Captain an unexpected kindness. "I think you're a runner."

"I am!" Alex turned "You too?"

Gyson nodded "I just ran the NYC half."

"No way. What was the route?"

"Around Central Park, with a dip into Harlem, through Times Square, and down the West Side Highway to lower Manhattan"

"I wanted to do that one!" Alex exclaimed saddened a little "I ran the Queens half a couple years ago I _was_ training for another."

"You _are_ training. I could use a running buddy if you're up for it." Paula Gyson looked optimistically into the eyes of Alexandra Goren.

"Is this therapy or friendship?" Alex asked not wanting therapy while she ran, running was an escape for her.

"Friendship." Gyson said simply.

"Okay. It's a plan."


	34. Chapter 34

The view through the windshield could have been any-borough New York (off the island). They drove down a wide busy street packed with screaming signs, some with sharp foreign characters, some small and handwritten, some bold and factory polished. The best ones were the head turners with provocative messages like: '24 Hour Tattoos' and 'Girls Girls Girls!'

And there were people in this cityscape. People everywhere. People walking and sitting and there was even one twirling (**_what was the story with that guy?_**). The people swung from the lampposts and stuck daring limbs into traffic and rushed along the sidewalks, a bobbing melange of heights and colours and widths.

Inside the car the noonday sun had turned the black vinyl trim into a skillet waiting to sizzle up bare unsuspecting flesh. The windows were cracked to temper the unnaturally cold air pouring from every vent. And the sun was a white beam, disabling retinas through the glass, Bobby slipped on his sunglasses and adjusted the visor. He accelerated smoothly glancing at Alex beside him. They had been getting along better in the 16 hours since Paula Gyson had swept in and left all their secrets on the living room floor. Each catching the others long lingering looks, looks that said: **_Who are you?_** and _**I know who you are,**_ all in one poignant stare. There was hardly enough time to predict the outcome of their therapy session or if there would be more, it had only happened yesterday. But the point was that they were thinking and they were sharing and today (on this jaunt to Flushing) they were following through. So score one for psychotherapy.

Alex admired Bobby's strong heavy jaw and tinted lenses. They hid the windows to his soul and the mysteries of his mind but also made him look _very_ cool. She was a sucker for him in shades. And because she could, because he was was hers and because he was beautiful she casually ran her fingers over the hair at his nape. Then she drew her nails lightly down his neck, watching his flesh and his shoulders rise. Ticklish. She smiled and he looked over at that moment and smiled back. Then he angled into her touch a few degrees, sopping up the warmth of her hand and the gesture.

"So Mike has news." He glanced at her phone charging on the centre console. "Anything else there about what it might be?"

She shook her head, "Nope, Just that it's about the accomplice."

On those words Alex felt a wave of unease. She'd felt it from the moment they'd decided to go see Mike, but she'd promised (in front of God and everyone) to arrange a meeting and she had. So here they were, going into this uncomfortable and emotional place to talk about Wallace. Again, there it was, this sickly abdominal squeezing.

She picked up her phone and thumbed through the text chain, "No new details."

"What about old details?"

"Nothing really, Mike just said he wanted to talk in person."

"That's fortuitous."

"Yeah." Yesterday after Gyson had left, Alex had picked up her cell to call Mike and it had pinged in her hand, a text from him asking to meet.

Bobby bit back a flip comment about how in sync she and Mike were because he didn't want her to think it was a dig. He felt no animus at all, in fact Bobby felt serene for the first time in a long time. He felt optimistic about everything. And in light of their revelations with the shrink yesterday Alex was perfect. Perfectly his.

_And she looked perfect._

He'd been meaning to tell her from the moment he'd seen her this morning but he hadn't managed to get it out of his mind and off his tongue. Then he'd thought it again when she'd emerged from her shower wearing a crisp white button up shirt rolled casually to the elbow with some tight (tight from her beautiful hips to her ankles) frayed faded jeans. He liked her best this way (but he said _that_ daily now) fresh and casual and striking. And here in the small cabin of the car she smelled like heaven in a body, like some spicy pumpkin aphrodisiac. A musky twist on her normal fleeting fruity fragrance. Most days she kept a wild wave in her hair now and he knew she did it for femininity and for his fingers (which were endlessly drawn to the hot mess). Suddenly he wanted to share this buoyant feeling with her. At a red light he turned, "You look beautiful today."

Her eyes flew to him, widening with pleasure. He never failed to surprise. She touched her hair reflexively and a soft smile played on her lips. "Thanks." The word was almost bashful. Bobby felt pride he could make this lioness bashful.

He melded their hands and rested that knot of fingers and rings in the vee of her thighs, he would gladly drive one handed if he got to hold his woman with the other. It still felt like a sweet treat belonging to her. He thought that this must be the best thing about marriage, living in a secret society of two. They always had, but now he had a companion to face each day. Now he had her warm body at night. Now he knew that it wasn't game over the second he did something wrong. Bobby liked the legal and emotional handcuffs of matrimony. Maybe because he couldn't help behaving badly. Maybe because, in this life, he needed more then his share of absolution.

"Turn here." she squeezed him. "Next left."

"Oh it's on this side of town." he mused.

"Yeah, you know, the block behind the DMV."

He nodded. "So what did you think of Gyson?" He asked casually for the first time. They'd just let the whole thing mellow since the psychiatrist had left, neither anxious for a post mortem on the session, both secretly surprised at the direction it had taken.

"She was great. I see why you spilled your guts to her back during the mandate." he heard the laughter in her tone. "Easy on the eyes too." she teased.

"Good thing I only have eyes for you."

**_Sweet talker._** She'd forgotten about this Bobby the one that could make her melt with a modest mouthful of words. He pulled her hand up to his mouth and pressed a kiss there then placed it back in her cradle.

"I think we could be friends." Alex said mildly.

"Us? With Gyson?" his brow dipped behind the shades.

"No. Me."

"Oh?" he said casually.

"She runs, I run."

"You want to be friends with our shrink?"

"Well she isn't _my_ shrink."

"I think the 25mg of Xanax she gave you would beg to differ." He shot out "She's your shrink."

"We don't have a line in our budget for a Park Avenue shrink. We aren't the NYPD." Paula Gyson had refused payment for her house call yesterday. She said it was the least she could do. She'd called it an honour, helping two people that had dedicated their lives to public service. They had blushed accordingly.

"Do shrinks even have friends?" He only half joked feeling a mild aggression at this conversation. "Do you really want to eat that?" He asked in his best Gyson voice.

She smiled. He was probably right, there would be a little of that, but from Alex as well. She and Paula had jobs that didn't shut off at 5pm. They had vocations, careers that took root in a person. But this was all conjecture. It might work out, it might not, who really cared. Alex just knew she intended to try. She wanted a normal life. A life with friends and hobbies and late lunches and frivolity to balance out her job. She had never thought this way before. It had never mattered. But now she had a daughter. She looked into the backseat at Immy or rather the rear facing carseat and the child's reflection in a mounted monkey mirror. Alex wanted her daughter to see that it wasn't all about working yourself to death (as she'd done for the last 2 decades), it was about loving yourself and your body and your husband and your family and your friends too.

Besides Alex was feeling a very real hole in her social life, one that her sister had readily tried to fill, but couldn't. Bobby had been enough at 1PP, he had kept her busy with his problems, their mission, her pining, but she found now that the dynamic had shifted. Now that they went to different jobs and now that their love was even and reciprocal she needed more. Alex had long given up on meeting other women of her age just for girlfriend fun but maybe she'd given up prematurely.

"She gave us some great suggestions, she cleared the air. I _feel_ better. But I think I need a friend more then I need a therapist right now."

"I'm not sure I agree." he said delicately, delicately breaking the news to her that she needed mental help.

"You think I'm losing it."

"I think you're stressed out."

"Yep. I am but Xanax and deep breathing and Nicole dead will solve that."

Her flip comment didn't startle him any more. "Okay."

"Okay?"

"I support whatever you want right now." He had to. He owed her whatever she needed, even if what she needed was the only shrink he had ever trusted. "Even though, for the record I do think of her as mine."

"Well, that sounded creepy and borderline unfaithful." she shifted in her seat.

"I meant _my shrink_ smart ass."

"Hmmm." she said. And then they rolled to a stop in front of Mike's office and she changed the topic. "Now behave yourself in here."

"I do not... " he started and she heard the outrage in those syllables. She reached out and stalled him with metal liquefying kiss, all teeth and tongue and zeal.

"I'm yours. You're mine." she whispered, "Remember that."

* * *

"Goren."

"Logan."

The two men sized each other up then smiled.

Their upturned lips were a product of collective memories. Memories of 1PP - with it's smoky watery brew and omnipresent captain. Memories of tag teaming Ethan Garrett. Memories of that pressure cooker inside lockdown at Brooklyn Fed and memories of finessing a small time reformed drug dealer named Raynard. They both remembered all of the scraps and meals that made up their acquaintance. And those memories (temporarily) overrode some of the hard, entrenched (even erroneous) ideas that time and distance had created.

Alex looked from one man to the other staying a few paces back from their reunion lest she become a lightening rod for their anger or jealousy. And from her place on the outside she got to consider the unique situation she was in. Her co-workers, then lovers, then… it was all very weird.

Suddenly she felt elated to be holding Imogen all soft and warm and restless and real. Thankful that catering to her daughter's tugging hands and babbling questions (_**and was that a full diaper?**_) could distract her from this reluctant ménage à trios. It was hard given all of the recent talk not to compare the two men. _**Not their sexual performance!**_ her habit-wearing moral voice hastened to assure, just their presence, their common history, their diverse approaches to life and their general air.

Bobby was taller. Check. And a few years younger. Check. They had remarkably similar physiques. Bobby was a 36 waist now (Alex should know she bought all of his pants, his measurements were on file at Channings For Men over in DUMBO) looking Mike up and down she would bet that he was as well. Logan still had that arrogant little smile he still managed to unnerve his subject with a joke only he was privy to. And Bobby still had a G-man's stoicism, her husband still preferred to gain the upper hand by purging his face of emotion.

"This is quite the operation you have here." Bobby said with a hint of admiration. Though Alex knew he would never be jealous of this. All of this expectation and responsibility would be a nightmare to a man like Bobby. Bobby was built to cut and run. He would break out in hives if he had to think about rent and employees and a full docket of cases with angry clients behind them.

"Yeah, 12 guys and a loft." Mike twinkled. Alex marveled. Mike was the only person she knew that could twinkle.

"So what have you got?" Alex cut to the chase. Putting down her baby girl and pulling up a chair. Seated, she swung one nude coloured pump up and over then rhythmically kicked the air. Those nerves were acting up again.

"I wanted to meet," Mike explained, "because this hits close to home."

"What do you mean?" she frowned.

"Donovan Carlson."

"Donny?" they said in unison, but Alex's inflection reflected considerably more surprise then Bobby's.

"Wallace has been working this town and her lackie is Donny. Your nephew." He stared Goren down.

To his credit Bobby held it together. He shifted uncomfortably and moved his head jerkily then pressed a hand to his mouth, but said nothing.

"One of my guys found a connection to Carlson at Mid-Hudson Psychiatric where Declan Gage was. One of the inmates with access to Gage had done time with Carlson. Not at Tates, afterward. Carlson got nabbed for that little escape attempt, the one in 2007, while shoplifting and did some short time for both upstate at Altona. It's not far off the border. We tracked him after that to Montreal, Canada. Looks like he met Wallace there. She was working as an untenured professor at McGill University. Carlson was working as a janitor."

"Donny." Alex shook her head again in disbelief.

"We poked around some more into his past, looked at his extra curriculars and associations and found a clear uptick in his criminal activity in 2010. Evelyn Carlson." He explained, "She was diagnosed with Stage 3 ovarian cancer in 2010. It was quick. She died a year and a half later. The kid spun out after that. His RAP sheet says it all." Mike handed Goren a copy of this confidential police document that no one wanted to know how he had gotten his hands on.

"It was hard to draw a line between him and Wallace. The woman is a cipher. She changes identities like people change underwear."

"But did you figure out how she pulled off this racket with the twin and the…"

"You two don't ask for much do you?" Logan snorted and moved around his desk taking the head seat. "Solve the crime of the century and give us the crib notes." He shook his head.

Alex turned to Bobby. "Donny." She muttered holding his eyes wondering how he felt about the betrayal.

"Donny." he said back on a sigh. Her eyes flicked back and forth looking for sadness but all she saw was resignation because Bobby was intimately acquainted with family and disappointment. But more then that she sensed that he already knew what Mike had just told them. Or had been trying not to know. And rather then begrudging him this new secret she just felt so sad. How much more could he take? How ungrateful and hateful could one family be? It seemed their unsolicited hostility was boundless. And Alex thought again,**_ this is why he needs me_**.

And Immy, the innocent psychic, chose that moment to pull up on tufts of daddy's crumpled trousers. Then she gazed up, way up, until her father couldn't ignore her.

"Do you want to come and see me?" he rumbled his voice had that distracted quality of a man caught between worlds. He looked at his child in her pretty pink dress and her small grip and imagined his brother's child wilfully trying to hurt her. He had gone to the wall for that boy, to give Donny a chance at having the life Frank had squandered. But this. He shook his head at private demons. And his daughter, now magically in his lap, kissed them away planting her intrepid mouth over his stubbly chin.

Bobby laughed, throatily (he had to) at the agony, ecstasy and absurdity of his life.

"Are you munching on daddy's chin." he cooed a little because who could resist cooing to such a sweet little thing.

Mike watched. This was Goren as a dad. And as he processed this scene he reformed a few more ideas about his former colleague. Mike was relieved and surprised to see that Goren could be silly, he could be gooey, he could loving. This was the portrait of the misfit as a father. Mike was jealous. Goren was really doing it and doing it well by the looks. The little girl was standing in the big man's lap now and ruffling his hair, as though checking for ticks.

"Da." the little girl shouted, "Da da da!" A booming pronouncement like she had discovered land over the bow of a ship (or perhaps equally important) her first and most enduring love. They all laughed. And the sound, the lilting highs and lows and rolling bass of mirth, burst the balloon of discomfort that had been filling the room.

"We haven't figured out how deep he's in with Wallace or how much he had to do with the kidnapping. That'll come out in allocution." Mike gave a wry smile. "I'll say one thing though he's easier to track. She's the pro, he's the one that used a stolen credit card, threatened a motel clerk in Brentwood, contacted an old buddy in his hometown."

"If we can get him we'll get her." Goren asserted remembering Nicole's attachment to her little protégés in the past, at that very moment he also remembered how disposable those protégés were.

"This sister Melissa Baird, the one with the husband and kids." Mike asserted "She's airtight. She's been living in state for over two decades. Living normal. Easy to trace. She had boyfriends and short jobs and internet profiles with pictures. She looks to be a real person." He shrugged and handed them her file. "I sent a guy out to Long Island. We found out that the husband," he looked at his notes, "Garrett Baird never came back. It looks like those 3 kids are orphans. They're still at granny and grampa's in Islip. The DNA authenticated the children's parentage. So that photo Wallace showed you," he looked a Bobby, "wasn't a bunch of child actors. The test samples were good, Garrett Baird was a blood donor and the mom well her stuff came from hair brushes inside the house. The DNA had it's limitations though still no way to separate the 'twins' or determine if there even are twins. Give us a few more days."

"You think that'll do it? Just a few more days." Goren said skeptically.

"Yeah. Something'll break in a few days." Mike said and leaned back testing the springs of his chair, "But it'll cost you extra."

"What?" Alex balked.

"Well Alex this is where the case splits. Either I hunt Wallace exclusively or I try and unravel your mystery. If I do both I need twice the guys."

"I'd like to see the pricing structure and the billable hours." Bobby said knowing that there would be elements of cost to haggle over, but now he grudgingly admitted that this was great. Mike was great.

"I wanted to get your opinion on setting trap for Donny." Mike said to Bobby and immediately his mind flew into overdrive.

"Yeah we need a big piece of cheese." _**For this rat.**_ Bobby mused helping Immy slide back to the floor.

How to catch a delinquent.


	35. Chapter 35

They were in the belly of Mike's headquarters (think tank, hangout space). This was the large-ish, light, lofty room where he assigned cases and traded information with his associates.

Alex watched Bobby interact with Mike's guys. It felt like a familiar sight even though it was only her second time in this room (and his first), even though she'd never met any of Mike's employees. Mike wasn't big on formal introductions, Alex figured they might forever be know as 'his guys'. **_Of course it feels familiar,_** she mused,** _it's like a squad room_.** Except that unlike a squad room Alex wasn't in the thick of it, she was staying well back because she wanted to give Bobby a chance to soak up this camaraderie, she wanted to let him hone his plan and tap that big brain. He didn't get to do this anymore, work a case. Alex felt the fine creep of nostalgia, but time marched on. The proof of that was Immy who sat in the adjacent waiting area playing with a binful of 'blocks', really they were old toner cartridge boxes that Mike had laying around in abundance. They didn't get many babies around here.

"He's in his element." Mike murmured and his voice was closer then she expected, his body only a couple of feet away. She'd been lost in the task of watching her family.

"Yeah, he loves this part." She leaned against a wall and watched Bobby gesture with those big powerful hands. She watched as he wove that long index finger through invisible wispy threads of air. She imagined the grand tapestry he was creating. She took a sip of coffee from a ceramic mug that said '_There's a chance this is wine._' All of Mike's mugs had some smart ass phrase on them. The empty one dangling from his pinky said '_Secretary's tears._'

"I love it when a plan comes together." Mike quipped drawing her back.

"Is it?" she looked up at him "Is it coming together over there?" He took up residence against 'her' wall, propping it up with his shoulder and the casual slant of his body, it felt like she was in the shade of an oak tree.

"Uh huh, he's briefing Louie, Tom and Marco."

"Oh? Are those their names?" She let the loaded questions hang, but her eyes were full of fun.

"Sorry sweetheart I meant to do the introduction thing but these guys are like furniture to me. I almost sat on Stevie the other day."

Alex guffawed at that. Mike could slip into a Bogey movie without breaking a sweat. Running a PI's office had brought out the romantic in him - and a bit of the chauvinist, that was the thing about a boys club. Alex should know.

She turned to him slightly, "You know, you wear this life well." She had to compliment the way he'd managed to leave pieces of himself all over the business. And she unconsciously leaned into his whipped and woolly personality. Mike was fresh and airy, Mike was thick and fuzzy.

"Alex!" Bobby's powerful voice cut through the moment like a case of tourettes. She actually jumped, it was so sharp and incongruent, but she didn't move because she wasn't doing anything wrong. _**Where does he get off? Calling me out like a kid.**_ She looked over at him and raised her brow, there was question and consternation there. And Bobby, he looked from her to Mike, his eyes dark and she understood the set of his face, Mr. Goren was very unhappy.

"Possessive." Mike murmured because he knew exactly what was going here, and because he was a born shit disturber he smiled down at Alex and touched her shoulder.

"Fuck off Mike." she launched like a velvet fist. "I told you not to provoke him." Her voice at just such a level that their exchange was private.

"I'm not." he took a step back before she pulled out a switchblade and gutted him.

"Good boy," Her eyes warned him, "Now you stand over there and tell me what's going on with them." She nodded at the group of playmakers that included her husband.

"Simple and genius," Mike gave credit where it was due "Declan's will is in probate." Alex nodded she knew that. She and Bobby had briefly speculated about the eccentric genuis, whether Declan had been flush or broke. It was impossible to know. His mind had certainly been whittled away by vices and Bobby speculated he'd had a degenerative cognitive disease. For all they knew he'd bequeathed his worldly goods to his cat or to one of his serial killers or maybe he'd spent it all on drugs and had been living hand to mouth. Or, Alex secretly (and a bit guiltily) wondered if maybe he had left Bobby one of those properties, or the royalties to all those books or a percentage of the years of pay from high level consultations, or the fruits of speaking engagements at John Jay or his tenure at Columbia. But for now there was no way to know. "Amends." Mike was saying.

"Amends?"

"The bait is an amends clause in the will."

"We don't know what's in the will yet."

"The kid doesn't know that."

"What will this amends clause say?"

"Just a Declan style admission of guilt in the death of Donny's father along with an implication of Nicole in the murder just to stir the pot. Also it will bequeath the kid a good amount of dosh, moola, money," he said enjoying his wordplay "Just to guarantee he breaks away from Wallace."

"How are you going to get the message to him?" Alex pushed off the wall to standing.

"The press." Mike followed her as she moved over to join the other men. Bobby watched Mike's eyes drop taking her in from behind. It was just a casual flick of the PI's gaze. A minute sweep that no man ever really begrudged another because it was animal instinct. But inside Bobby machismo and this office were strange bedfellows and he felt a rush of red and his temperature spiked. He felt irrational. He wanted to sweep everything off this desk and tell Mike to fuck off. He wanted to find someone else to take the case. He wanted to take his wife and his baby and walk out. Instead he stayed put, a glowering statue.

"How are you going to counteract the Nicole effect? She'll know this is all a trick." Alex asked Bobby, unaware of the surging blood and racing pulses beneath his fair skinned facade.

His voice was clipped "Donny is weak. He's erratic, or at least he was, and I'm willing to bet he'll go rogue. If we plant the seed he won't be able to resist. She doesn't have him completely under her thumb. He wouldn't be with Nicole if he believed she'd killed Frank."

"Maybe you're making him more moral then he is. What makes you think he'll be loyal to Frank? Frank was never really his father." Alex suggested helping him refine his plan with contradiction.

"Okay." he nodded to a mysterious beat, "Okay, okay. Then we offer him full immunity. That's a powerful show of good faith."

Alex was galled. "The DA has to do that and I'm not going to bat for Donny." **_That ungrateful, stupid little punk._**

"Nicole is the bigger fish." Bobby pushed "Put this in perspective Alex. You think Donny has the intelligence or the inclination to do any of this? He's a pathetic puppet. He's Mark Bayley, he's Dan Croyden, he's Ella Miyazaki, he's got stars in his eyes and a target on his back."

She looked at Mike for reassurance, because she was pretty sure Bobby's objectivity was shot.

Mike pursed his lips clearly not wanting to step in it. "Well, I know he's unorganized or I wouldn't have been able to follow his trail." Mike offered and Bobby looked like he was about to go into orbit. _He was so angry._ But Alex ignored him and kept her eyes on Mike, because Mike was impartial. "His sheet as you saw was pretty penny ante, no violence, lots of crimes of opportunity. I think Goren is right, Donny is a pawn."

"We just have to plant the wedge between him and Nicole." Bobby shot out pulling her eyes back to him. "Let his paranoia do the rest."

"The kid's curiosity and greed will win out." Mike threw in and Alex turned to him.

"He's alone she's just offering him direction and sex." Bobby pushed and Alex looked to him.

"We can't say for sure he's an innocent but we _know_ Wallace is evil." Alex looked at Mike and nodded.

And as Alex felt her head ping pong back and forth, she realized that they were vying even though they were agreeing. This was nothing more then a pissing contest and she was the catalyst.

Mike continued holding onto her eyes. "The question is location and timing for this meet."

"That isn't a question actually. It's been decided." Bobby shot out giving the man a penetrating stare. The employees had all taken a visible step back no one wanting to get involved in whatever the hell was going on here and that effectively pushed the waring trio into the centre of a ring of their own making. "The time is immediately. The location is Bateman and Klein Attorney's at Law, they're the actual firm processing the will in case Nicole still has pull at the county clerks and checks. And these are our attorney's he gestured at the 'guys' we just need some suits and a boardroom."

* * *

The ride home from Mike's office was nothing like the ride there. An enormous vacuum had sucked all the goodwill and air right out of the car.

"He had better stay the fuck away from you." Bobby burst suddenly and her head whipped around. That had been building in him. Bobby wasn't one for profanity not unless there was no other way to express the scope of his emotion. And since he gladly, punched and paced and twitched and tossed, he had no problems with repression. But not now, now he felt vulnerable.

"I am a viable part of this investigation. This is my child's life."

"Mike Logan wants you."

She almost choked on rancid laughter. "Mike is a harmless flirt."

"Harmless! Harmless!" he roared "He's harming me. I won't watch him try to... try to exploit you."

"What?" her head shook with the force of her annoyance. "Exploit?"

"You are vulnerable right now Alex. You aren't yourself."

"I am not going to betray my vows with Mike Logan." she said between clenched teeth watching the world fly toward them through the windshield.

"You say that now..."

"I'm not just saying anything. I know that!" she shouted.

But he wasn't so sure.

Alex held her breath for the 41 minutes it took to get home.

* * *

She wanted to put the screws to him, demand answers, press the issues that had come up at Mike's, but she decided to wait for him to naturally unlock. She decided Mike had given them more then enough food for thought to keep her mind chewing in the mean.

But even a saint had her limits. When they got home to silence, when she gave Immy a bath in silence, when she got some pasta started in silence, when she found herself flicking on the TV just to clear the _interminable silence_ she finally broke. She marched into their office and stood over him. He didn't look up he was prepping for tomorrow. Their first day back at work. He was reading a file, the course work he'd missed. It had been sent via email courtesy of his fellow lecturers in the program. One good thing to come of this was that Bobby's job was rock solid, now he had even more cred on the podium, now that the world had watched his personal crisis unfold, now that everyone had seen him profile to fantastic results. He'd actually gotten other offers. He was being courted by criminology departments across the country. And the FBI? Well they were holding onto him with two seized gnarled fists a contract renegotiation was in the offing.

Alex put her hands on her hips. And even though she cast a long shadow and was a big black mass on his periphery he still didn't look up. "Tell me." she demanded at last.

"Tell you what?" he was sullen now and uncommunicative.

"You knew."

"Knew what?"

"Really? Are we going to play this game? You want to start with the secrets again? You knew about Donny."

He sighed heavily. "Deduction." And he seemed to think that that answer was sufficient because he went back to his work.

"Deduction?" she repeated.

"Deduction." he sighed again, and looked up at her slowly "It was all in here." he nudged the e-reader in her direction. The title page to 'A Double Barrelled Detective Story' popped off the screen in simulated ink.

"Not this God damned story again!" She said with barely veiled venom, then rubbed her forehead, hard.

"That's how I felt." he said but something had been niggling at him and that something had compelled him back to the text. He hadn't mentioned it because the story (and all it stood for) enraged his wife. "I don't really want to get into the details now." Bobby felt sick to his stomach, he felt like on the next sentence his lunch was going to come up all over the desktop.

"Okay." Alex conceded and finally admitted that she might have to read the story. Thus far she'd held off on principle. Let Bobby play into Nicole's hands. Alex didn't want anything to do with it. The thought of reading 'Nicole's' story, of knowing that her mind would be working in tandem with that degenerate was enough to make her want to do a home lobotomy. But it would seem that for whatever reason it was the playbook, it was the codex for their little mystery and Alex couldn't (no matter how hard she tried) deny that.

"I'm going to read it." she bit out angrily snatching up the tablet with rage, rage at life and at short stories and most of all at Nicole Wallace.


	36. Chapter 36

Work loomed.

And that one big decision, the one that had become so easy to defer suddenly became unignorable.

**_What are we going to do with Imogen?_** The question whispered in the creak of their joints when they crouched to play. It was in the gust of each breath during story time. It was in the flick of their hands during peekaboo. The question was their constant companion jumping and jockeying for attention during every task. How could they keep their daughter safe while earning a living? And then the clock ran out. And without the luxury of time suddenly it was so simple. It flowed out something Paula Gyson had said (during their one and only session) when she'd recounted the tale about her celebrity client, the one battling a stalker. Naturally Alex had asked what the client had done with her children.

"She hired a full time bodyguard." Paula Gyson had said with a crooked smile, understanding that this solution was a luxury of the 1% not the remaining 99. "But she told me that even with an armed guard the only time she could breathe was when they were with her."

**_When they were with her._**

**_When they were with her._**

Alex had repeated that statement in her head until she understood what she needed to do. And in a moment of perfect synchronicity Bobby (who had watched his wife with dismay as work neared, her sleepless nights and round the clock sadness) had turned to her and said,

"I think you need to take Immy to work with you."

And Alex laughed and laughed and laughed because it was the most ridiculous idea he'd ever given voice to, and yet it was exactly what she intended to do. So she just did it, that first day, amid queer looks from her battalion, she set up a play pen in her office. And quickly found it wasn't comfortable or sustainable (not without help) or even permissible. These two intrepid crime-fighters - Alex and Bobby - had thought that the home/work balance was hard before Nicole Wallace. Now they understood what it meant to be naive. This new setup, this new system made their old life from just a month ago feel like Nirvana lost. Imagine the specter of your worst fears, exponentially compounded by the daily commute, by endless demands and by the kind of jobs that required _spectacular_ output. These weren't jobs where you could coast. The Gorens couldn't be warm bodies in a seat praying for Friday. They had to float, they had to finesse, they had to transfix people with their authority, insights, ability and general acumen. Bobby with his auditorium and Alex the colonel of her small Inwood-ian army.

So she and Bobby hatched a plan. A plan to seek special dispensation for their extenuating circumstances.

It hadn't taken much really, Bobby placed a call to the secretary of the Chief of D's (who was still Marla and who still thought that the NYPD had given them a raw deal and who Bobby suspected had always had a crush on him). And as her own little stand, her own little _fight the power_ moment, Marla had dug into her virtual rolodex and pulled out the Commissioners direct number, not some anonymous switchboard, rather the line he used for friends and family. Bobby proudly handed it to his wife.

In a move that took enormous chutzpah Alex cut right through the reams of red tape and tapped that number into her phone. She might not have done it if she'd been flying blind, if she'd had to give a messy introduction and a stilted story to a stranger. But Alex knew they had some pull with the commish. It was a name she and Bobby knew well: Leland Dockerty. And he was no longer deputy to the mayor's right hand, now he _was_ the mayor's right hand. In the intervening years Leland Dockerty had weathered the loss of his only child and held onto his job but sacrificed his marriage in the process. And this was the inaugural year of his second appointment as Commissioner of the NYPD. He had immediately remembered Alex, or more accurately, Bobby who had frustrated and confronted him at every turn during those rough 5 days in 2007.

Spurred by time sensitivity Alex had pressed for (and secured) a face to face with him. She suspected that she had tucked nicely into his calendar between a tournament golf match and dinner at Gracie mansion, but that was only speculation.

She had fretted on her way over that Dockerty might be nursing a grudge against Bobby, but as it turned out he wasn't. Leland Dockerty was a changed man, older, softer, more introspective. He still had a voice that could grind glass (Dirty Harry was jealous) but Alex panned for a glimpse of the authoritarian, egoist she'd met years ago and couldn't find him anywhere. Rather she found a sympathetic ear.

Alex's fears resonated with Dockerty. He knew about the paralyzing agony of searching for a missing child and moreover of that child being your only daughter. He understood cop culture and he understood the fine balance of gender equality inside the NYPD. That last one because Alex had told him that she was seriously considering cashing it all in. Leaving an esteemed career of over 25 years just to protect her daughter. Leland Dockerty immediately sat forward in his large padded cognac coloured leather chair, clasped his hands and said:

"We can't afford that loss. And the NYPD can't afford that loss. We don't need the pain or publicity of trying to fill the position of another good strong woman because we won't let her strike a home/work balance."

It was a bit like a speech from a pulpit (so there was a smidgen of the old Dockerty there afterall) but Alex didn't mind a little soap boxing if he agreed with her. And because there was nothing on the books to help Alex he vowed put something on the books.

"We'll just start with doctor's note, of sorts." he smiled "My verbal and written sanction for you to provide daycare inside the 34th precinct. Don't let anyone give you any guff about it. I'm going to bring this up as a citywide initiative with the Mayor. New York's finest deserve peace of mind when it comes to their children."

Alex could have cried with relief, she could have fallen to her knees and kissed his wingtips and the periwinkle blue carpet that covered his office floor but instead she was stoic and quietly thankful. She left not knowing (or believing really) that her small request would ever grow into a citywide daycare solution for cops and support staff. She could imagine it would be a security nightmare and that infrastructure changes and regulation tweaking and staff hiring costs would tally up into the millions. She remembered talk of it at 1PP in the late 80's and now that daycare was about to be decommissioned. After tens of thousands dollars in municipal investment the project had failed.

But Alex quite selfishly didn't care about any of it. Alex hadn't come to Leland Dockerty to be a trailblazer, she didn't want to be the poster gal for family rights in the NYPD. Alex could barely walk a straight line. She could barely get dressed each morning. She was so fraught and tired of looking over her shoulder and of double (triple, quadruple) checking the locks on their apartment door. All she had the energy to think about right now was her small family.

She needed a babysitter to work out of the precinct.

She needed her child to be just steps away.

She just wanted her child to be safe.

* * *

And it was on day 5 that it happened.

Their fifth less-then-blissful day back in the workforce.

Their commute began with eerie familiarity. They rode the subway together that morning all three of them. They got on the F train, then switched to the A train and then like clockwork exchanged quick kisses and quiet 'I love you's' and now, (_this was new_) they implored each other to **_please God_** be safe, before Bobby hopped off and headed to the PATH rail system, bound for Newark. Alex pushed her daughter in a new but similar light maneuverable stroller packed with baby necessities and workday stuff. Only now Alex carried her side arm (of course) but also her ankle spare and Bobby's blade at the small of her back.

She wasn't leaving anything to chance.

She wasn't going to be a sitting duck.

She thought about him on that commute. He'd secured the knife to her body this morning. His warm loving hands preparing her for battle. They'd met each other's eyes in the bathroom mirror. She only in her bra. He'd run his hand over the creamy flesh of her abdomen as he'd affixed the cold metal to her back with fabric tape. And he laughed (though it was no laughing matter) because laughing was all you could really do.

And Bobby had also taken to carrying his piece again. He was permitted to carry as a term of his job but he never had, he'd never needed to until this week. He wasn't going to be a sitting duck either.

Alex took notice of everything and yet nothing on those commutes. Her observations were there and then gone on a puff of smoke to make room for new ones. A new one every millisecond. And of course she had her daughter to see to, so like all mothers her attention was split.

That explained why she didn't see him right away. But she felt the hair on the back of her neck rise and she heard his footsteps behind her as she exited the subway station. Funny that, there were hundreds of pairs of feet and probably tens of shady characters amongst them, but she had felt his presence and heard his steps. She quickened and he quickened. But this wasn't a New York alley at 1am, this was rush hour and Alex wasn't a damsel in distress she was a decorated police officer so she whirled to face her threat.

Her threat was a pathetic case, rail thin, with medium brown curls, a neglected hairdo that kicked out at the back, a heart shaped face and a pair of navy blue eyes with a inky hollows beneath them. His green army jacket looked like a thrift shop special. And even though he hadn't said a word his look implored. And it was the imploring that was most familiar. It was a look that Alex had seen before on a busy weekday morning (just such as this one) from Frank Goren.

"Do you know me?" he asked. And confronted with her silence he repeated it a little more aggressively. "Do you know me?"

"I know your face from pictures. I know your shape because you got dragged past me into holding, Donny."

"I saw the article." he said.

"What article?" She played dumb.

He looked at her hard and she could see that he didn't believe her, "In the Herald. About Gage's will."

"So you're here following me? I can't help you." She edged in front of the stroller a bit creating a barrier and took the safety tether in her hand coiling it around her wrist. It wasn't rolling anywhere without her, and Imogen was strapped in tightly by all 5 points of her harness. "How did you even know where I was?" Alex lay her other hand on her weapon.

"Nicole told me."

"I appreciate your honesty Donny." she repeated his name trying to forge a connection no matter how small.

"She told me you're a captain."

"I am."

"She told me you married my Uncle Bobby."

Alex nodded.

"Is that your baby?" he tossed his head toward the stroller, "with Uncle Bobby?"

Alex didn't know what he was playing at. "Yes." she said shortly not wanting his attention anywhere near her child.

"Can I see her." He leaned in their direction.

"That's close enough." Alex barked.

"You think I want to hurt her." It was a statement.

"I think you're hanging out with the wrong kind of people."

He did a little dance a light shuffle of feet, a shifting of weight as though he were uncomfortable with stillness then plunged a hand deep into his hair. For a split second she saw Bobby there in front of her, in some shadow of DNA, some trick of the light, but just like that he was gone.

"You've got Nicole wrong."

Alex laughed tight and throaty. "No _you_ have her wrong." She couldn't believe this man-child, and really that was how he looked, like his development had been arrested around Tates. Like he'd grown harder but not wiser. "Turn yourself in. Come to the precinct with me."

He smirked with dead eyes. "No. I don't think so."

"Then why are you here?"

"Nicole wants to meet with you. I'm just delivering a message."

"I'll meet with Nicole in an interrogation room after she's turned herself in."

"For?"

"Kidnapping my child." She felt her temperature rise at all of his faux innocence. "For murdering 5, no make that 6 people once Garrett Baird washes up, in the last month. Tell Nicole this time it's lethal injection." At his crafted look of shock she expelled "Don't pretend you're innocent, she couldn't have done it alone."

"Is that what Uncle Bobby thinks? That I'm a murderer." And she sensed that even now part of him was still looking for love and approval.

"No. Just the stupid accomplice." She should have held her tongue. She should never have said it. He was balancing on a piano wire. He was unstable. He had nothing to lose.

"Nicole said you'd be a bitch." His voice was like an ice flow. There was rage around his mouth in the flare of his nostrils, not all about her, it was institutional rage Alex had seen it before, in a million eyes of a million ex-cons. "She said it was always you keeping Bobby, hold him back, she said… she said…"

"What? What else?" Alex encouraged his delusions because talking was better then silence.

"She said we'd be doing the world a favour if we got rid of you."

**_Ahhhh, there it was._ **Alex felt sickly vindicated to hear it from his twitchy insecure little mouth. The endgame, what she'd always known Nicole had in mind. "I'm placing you under arrest." She informed him, "Uttering threats to a police officer, for starters."

He smiled then, just a tick of the lips. "Are you going to arrest me? Or hold onto your baby?"

Alex whipped around and caught sight of a glint of blond. There was a woman, head down in a baseball cap moving toward her. _**Right build, right colouring**_ her cop senses on full alert. **_Tagged teamed,_** she thought her dread spreading, _**smart little criminals**_. They closed in from opposite sides and Alex desperately tried to split her focus to keep them both in her sights. In addition to being impossibly situated on this street she was both physically and emotionally tied in place by her daughter. She imagined Nicole approaching, propelling through the waves of pedestrians like a Great White but instead of a crushing jaw she'd have a syringe full of some toxin. Alex imagined being 'bumped' like Zach Thaler and Bernard Fremont and having only having a split second to say goodbye to Bobby and Imogen forever on this mediocre New York street corner. Her heart kicked into overdrive, her pupils flared and her muscles contracted, her body was awash with adrenaline.

She did the only thing she could think to, she let go of the stroller and wedged her body up against it using her heel as a wheel block. Then in less than a blink she grabbed a double hank of that olive-drab sleeve, the one attached to Bobby's delinquent nephew. And she pulled him so sharply and suddenly toward her that he tripped. She spun him by his coat like she was the hub of a whirligig. His head careening toward the pavement. It was a chain reaction, Donny's sprawling form, catching a woman in a pantsuit beside him, her tumbling off the curb knocking back into a man in a red and navy Purolator Courier uniform. The street was a mess of stumbling and tripping and cursing and yelps and general chaos.

"Son of a bitch!" Donny shouted now red faced and impotent struggling to move from prostrate to viable, scrambling to his feet with remarkable speed. He was fast. He couldn't have been more then a 120lbs soaking wet.

"Police officer! Police officer!" Alex now thought to yell because she had drawn her gun. She searched for Nicole throwing her head wildly to and fro. "Stay back." she barked at Donny's still unsteady form but he was drunk, he was in some thrall and he stood and charged. Hand to hand combat. Donny didn't seem to care that she was smaller, or a woman, or his aunt (by law) or that she had a baby. He was in a cult. He had a mission.

"Stop." she commanded again even as his body hit hers and she crashed back into the stroller. the only thing that stopped it from falling over was the wall behind but still it was at a precarious angle and Imogen was _screaming_. She did not want to shoot him, _**I cannot shoot him.**_

Alex managed to knock Donny back from her again with a smooth tactical strike, the heel of her palm to his chin. He was messy, untrained, he was a weak unworthy opponent. Then he seemed to get that because he just stopped. He stood stalk still and looked at her with those pitiful eyes. And Alex started to come down, because he seemed to be coming to his senses. Her breathing softened a bit and her pointed gun shuddered just a little in emotional hands. "Calm down." she yelled "Calm down and put your hands on your head."

People around had long scattered no one offering assistance. Alex reached behind her to right the stroller without letting her gun or gaze waiver. But Donny didn't listen, his hands did not go to his head. And her pulse skyrocketed again. "I said hands on your head." she shouted, and he just stared.

This was the moment.

The moment of dread.

The moment when the perp wouldn't listen and they clearly meant you harm.

The moment when fear and death were an entity with a pungent an odour.

He reached into his jacket.

She fired.

* * *

Bobby was stepping off the train in Newark when his cellphone rang.

"Shame about your wife Bobby."

"Nicole?" His blood ran cold. The first case of spontaneous muscle atrophy made him stumble right there on the metal ventilation grate. "Nicole?"

"She tried." The voice taunted with a light laugh wrapped in delicate lilting english. It was all a glamour that masked her true cackle and shriek. "It just wasn't her day."

**Click.**

His heart pounded. Panic played with his breath. Rooted in place he dialled that number, her number, the one he knew as well as his own name, 10 digits burned into his brain that meant warmth, love, connection.

**Ring.**

**Ring.**

**Ring.**

**Ring.**

**Ring.**

"_Hello you've reached the voicemail of Alexandra Goren. I can't come to the..._" His phone slipped from useless fingers striking the ridge of pavement and a web of fine hairline fractures worked across the glass face.


	37. Chapter 37

He'd broken his fucking phone.

_Broken his phone._

Then he'd wasted useful minutes scrounging for it, bending to pat the ground only to find it had slipped between the station wall and the concrete footing of a bench. Then he spent more precious time tap tap tapping away at the face and buttons trying to get something, a glow, a blink, a sound - with no result. Now he was flying blind. He couldn't call Alex _**(please Alex be okay)**_ or the precinct or anyone for that matter. _**Work. Oh God. Work**_. Robert Goren had never (in his entire life) been paralyzed by anything. Even in fear he moved. He hoisted his shoulders up around his ears, ruffled his hair, let his fingers grip and pulse and he paced maniacally. Today, here, on a rail platform he was immobile. People scowled, and grunted and shook their heads at his still form, smacking into him with backpacks and purses and jostling him in annoyance. He wasn't a small man and he was occupying valuable commuter real estate on this walkway, but he _couldn't_ move.

And then sense returned. **_Nicole._** She was the master of games. Her phone call in itself didn't mean anything he told himself. _**Nicole is a manipulator. Nicole is a liar.** _He chanted because if he stood here and thought about the worst he would petrify right in this spot inside this station. Then the building would decay and one day they would have to scrape away the moss and the excrement to find him. No what he needed was to move forward with positivity.

"Can I use your phone?" He asked the next body that nudged him. A teen gave him a look like he was insane then stuck in her earbuds and kept walking.

"Please, _please_ can I use your phone?" He held up his own cracked one to make more of a sympathetic case.

"Sorry buddy, late." A short blue collar looking guy in coveralls waved him off. Strangely he never once considered the prospect of a landline or a payphone so gone from the scope of his reality were they. He felt like he'd fallen into an abyss without his technology. Convenience had stripped his ability to think creatively.

He lurched toward the waiting area and away from the frantic movers. He found an older black woman seated there, her shocking white hair was like a beacon calling him home. Her posture and the array of luggage and reusable bags at her feet told him she was in it for the long haul, waiting for a trans-national maybe? Her large body was wedged neatly between the reflective metal handles of the public chair. Bobby didn't know if she was the demographic that carried a phone but he held his wrecked one up anyway, his eyes imploring. "Please can I use your phone?"

"Sure honey you just sit down here beside me." And with that she pulled a state of the art device from her one of her bags. He collapsed gratefully into a chair. He figured that twitching above her was bound to make her reconsider. He was still coursing with nervous energy in that seat. "You take a deep breath now." she said reading him in an instant. And he did. Sucking in boldly, theatrically, to let her know she mattered, and because he had been listening to Paula Gyson's tutorial to Alex. Breathing. It was so important.

After a brief learning curve on this foreign device he was calling. And she, his matronly benefactor, was watching intently from one seat away.

First work. "Something has happened to my wife. I can't come in…."

Then the 34th. "No Captain Goren isn't in yet this morning. Let me check…"

Then Alex. "Hello you have reached…"

Then Alex again. "Hello you have reached…"

Then Alex frantically one more time. "Hello you have reached…"

"Alex please Alex" he muttered the recorded message was heartbreaking.

His audience looked on solemnly. At last he just stared at his loaner phone, forlorn. Then, on a burst - **_no petrifaction!_** - he courteously wiped the screen on his trousers and gave it back to his good samaritan. And in a surprising, but not unwelcome move, she held the phone and his hand briefly in hers. The warm soft pads of her fingers sweeping, once, twice, three times over his defeated knuckles. Her eyes were soft, her mouth a downturned parabola of sympathy.

"Oh sweetie. It's just not your day."

He tried to smile. He felt like tears. He stood.

"I have a sixth sense about these things." she told him. "She is going to be just fine. _Just fine._ And then you can both cut that cancer out of your lives, together."

His eyes widened. Was she some Haitian witch doctor? Some harbinger? Some angel of mercy? A goodwill talisman he'd conjured with his frantic mind?

"I have 5 kids of my own." She explained "I've seen every dark day there is. Even lost one of them last year. It is going to be _fine_."

Bobby didn't know what to do or say. He shifted uncomfortably on his feet, the shuffle of the unsure. All those years pounding the pavement, talking to men and women of every age, race, walk and station and suddenly today he was rookie, green and untried without a word or a clue.

"You go on to Alex now." she dismissed him. But first he pressed a business card into her hand.

"If there were any charges… long distance… "

"Go. Go. She needs you."

And he did.

Transcendence in a train station.

* * *

He went straight to the 34th. He felt a buzz while walking up from the subway, a twitter, a murmurer. He followed his wife's well worn tread along the busy street she walked every morning. Bobby had only been here with Alex once. They had walked this path together before she'd taken the captain's job. Alex had been heavily pregnant at the time.

**_"Whew all this walking. You want to be born in Inwood like your mama." She'd joked to the tummy._**

They'd held hands that day, ducked into some local shops, sat a spell with drinks (a coffee and fruit smoothie respectively) at a place called 'The Delightful Bean' and Bobby had speculated that it might be her new favourite coffee place (when, of course, she could drink coffee again). That day they'd casually met some residents and scouted out her walking route to the precinct and just soaked up the neighbourhood. Alex knew Inwood but she'd needed a street level refresher.

Today Bobby flew past 'their' coffee shop without even a hint of recognition. Today he couldn't think of anything besides the pounding fear. He rounded the corner onto a 182nd and his heart beat faster. Police tape. On the ground was the congealed dirty red of spent blood, now cooking in the sun.

"What happened here?" He asked generally from the back of a medium sized group of bystanders. Again he was relying on the kindness of strangers.

"Cop shot some kid." A woman tossed over her shoulder.

He flagged a cop, a uniform.

"Robert Goren." he said hoping for some surname recognition in this district. "Who got shot here?"

"Keep moving buddy."

"Go - ren." he annunciated rudely, "My wife is Captain Goren." he hated this civilian bullshit, he longed for his badge so that he could tear this stupid flatfoot a new one.

"Uh." the officer's brow furrowed "Uh sorry." And the uniform made an executive decision, a rare treat in his world of abject subordination "The Cap shot a kid."

Bobby cursed the idiot that had answered his earlier phone call to the precinct. That dumbass could have told him all this_ on the phone_. Instead of finding Alex, now he was stumbling through the timeline of her morning. Now he was creating horrible scenarios, each ring concentrically worse then the one before. He felt anxiety accost him,_ he was wasting valuable time_. He wanted to throw something.

"Was the captain hurt?"

"I'm not sure." The officer admitted a bit sheepishly.

"Well where was she now?" he demanded with only the authority of his anger. And it worked, his obvious comfort at a crime scene, his imposing figure, his expensive suit and dark overcoat all conspired to get Bobby more information.

"I don't know." he shrugged a little " but they took this guy" he thumbed the bloodstain, "to the hospital, The Allen…"

Bobby didn't even wait for the rest of the sentence. It was a straight shot 10 minutes away on the M train.

* * *

He didn't know what to expect when he tore through the doors of The Allen Hospital. And then he was waylaid at the front desk because he found out that Alex wasn't a patient. **_Not a patient?_** The lightness of relief was quickly tainted by more dark thoughts. So she hadn't been shot on scene. But had she been poisoned? Or maybe sedated and taken? **_Oh God. Immy._ **He was shaking and his stomach was tossing and ….

"Sir are you okay." He wasn't. He was grey and green. The receptionist with the fuzzy pink cardigan leaned in concerned.

And as she did Bobby remembered the other victim. The kid. And in the fanciest bit of talking he'd ever done (he didn't have a name and he wasn't the boys relative after all) Bobby managed to get the floor and room number of the shooting victim from 182nd Street.

As he raced toward the elevator he didn't know what he hoped for. Maybe somebody knew something about Alex. Maybe there were eyewitnesses caught in the crossfire. Maybe there were other officers who he could work for information. After jabbing the button impatiently at least 10 times, he headed for the stairwell. He sprinted up the stairs to the second floor his long stride taking steps two at a time. He made his way to intensive care. Flying past rooms. Flying past the waiting area, moving toward the nurses station, then he froze. He heard the low tones of familiar voices. He whirled abruptly and moved back the way he came.

The waiting room.

And he couldn't even get his head around what he saw there.

**_What?_**

**_What the fuck?_**

And then it flew past his lips.

"WHAT THE FUCK is this!?" he was becoming increasingly comfortable with his potty mouth since that stupid blond nutcase had entered their lives. Bobby was vibrating on the highest levels of worry and fear and loathing. Today alone, he'd begged people for assistance, he had been all over the city, he had talked his ass off for crumbs of information. And now he'd _finally_ found Alex and she was alive and well and in the arms of _Mike Logan_.

Alex jumped about a foot and sprung away her PI admirer.

"Bobby." her voice was high and nervous. "Mike called me he has news and I told him what happened he came over and I couldn't reach you and I..." It was all one horrible run on sentence.

As he watched this smarmy piece of work, Mike Logan, taking liberties, his last coherent thought was: **_So this is seething. _**

His eyes narrowed on Logan.

And before Bobby could be rational or breathe or count to 10 he launched himself at the other man. Logan was strong and a little bit street and he had thrown enough punches in his life to know how to block them. But he had asked for _every single one_ of those punches. He'd expected them. He'd even grinned and taunted the cretins that threw them. But Robert Goren? Robert Goren coming at him was out of left field. And because of that Bobby nailed him. He nailed him good.

Logan doubled over and spun. His body swiveling from one magnetic pole to the other, from due north to due south. He crouched there for a moment, then he stood slowly and turned, working the joint in his jaw unnaturally from side to side making sure it was still engaged. It was.

"You are going to pay for that." He growled and threw his body forward.

"No." Alex yelled "No." She flung herself into it. "What are you doing?" demanded of Bobby. But Mike had to get at least one in, they were the rules of engagement, the law of evening up. If he didn't swing he wouldn't be able to concentrate around the other man for wanting to smash his face. So he did, he lunged over Alex's small frame and sent one flailing arm (with very poor form) and hit Goren square in mouth. The thrust of his fist splitting the younger man's lip and snapping his head back.

Bobby had always preferred brains to brawn but not today. Today he was somebody else. Today he had reached his limit. Today weeks of misery came to head and Mike Logan looked a lot like the body bag at the gym. "You think you can touch my wife?" He smeared blood into his teeth and across his chin with the back of his hand "Stay the fuck away from my wife!" His rage was absolute and he lunged again.

"Bobby." Alex screamed, she had never actually screamed before, with that hallmark hysterical edge, but she was trying to slice into his calloused epidermis, through layers of biology. This was about so much more then this moment. This was about commitment but also strength and sperm and superiority. "Stop it! Stop it!"

But they didn't listen. Her sanity was unwelcome. And she couldn't shoot them, so she got out of the way. They were bent on brutalizing each other, mostly shoving and slamming but throwing the odd punch too. And it was foolish and it was scary. Alex had seen a lot of brutality in her life, but mostly the end result and never as a personally invested party. They were both very strong men and the clashing of flesh and fabric was intense. They knocked over a chair, then a small table. Like bucks in rut or rams they butt so forcefully that their flesh vibrated on the bone. And in the end Alex wasn't the voice of reason it was a pair of orderlies and pair of security guards that stopped the melee.

"You two have to leave." The guard said sternly. "Or we'll call the police."

A universal snicker went up from the group at that.

"We are the police." Logan couldn't resist that wiseass comment under his breath flinching at the pain in his face.

Goren and Logan moved as far from each other as two people could do and remain in the same room. Alex pulled her badge and that (and that alone) saved them the embarrassment of being escorted off the premises.

"They'll behave." She tried to smile reassuringly but it ended up a grimace.

"We won't write you up... this time." The head of security said surveying the room and sensing that the energy in had shifted and mellowed.

Once they were alone again Alex barked, "Logan out." And Mike looked at her face and then down at her gun and didn't argue.

"You're in trouble." he singsonged as he left. And Bobby looked like he was weighing up the consequences of another swing. Alex grabbed his chin hard and pressed her salty finger into his wound turning his face back to her.

"Owwww." he grabbed her hand "owww."

"What the hell was that Bobby?"

"Why the hell was he touching you?" he countered angrily.

"It was a platonic hug. I was upset."

"That is no excuse!"

"I couldn't reach you."

"So you found a warm body stand in? Did it feel like old times pressing up against him?" He spat. He was batting a thousand today. She almost got in a swing of her own. Instead Alex took out her aggression on his chest. She put both hands and all her force into one ferocious push and he took a step back. Shove, step. Shove. step. Shove, step. Until he came up against the windowsill.

"Are you trying to push me out of the window?" He was joking but there was no laughter in his voice.

"Cheaper then a divorce." she said with the same weight. She shook her head. She couldn't believe him. In all their years together she had never seen him act this way. "Sit." she snapped and he did, balancing against the frame. She examined his face and he felt his lids grow heavy under her touch. She angled his cheekbone to the light **_this is going to bruise_.** "Stay." She bit out and moved away. Then came back and cleaned the blood away with a moistened napkin. "You are an idiot." Her smooth loving touch belied her words. "Is this how you want your daughter to see you behave?"

_**Immy!**_ His eyes flew to her. _**Some father.**_ He hadn't even realized his daughter was in the room. And she was riveted, sitting bolt upright eyes wide under the canopy of her violet coloured stroller clutching the roll bar in front of her. Her head flicking back and forth with an occasional wobble. Bobby sighed from his soul.

"That was really stupid." Alex laid into him "Mike has something for us. News. What if he takes his toys and goes home? Then what tough guy? You have to apologize."

"Nicole called me." He said suddenly.

"What? When?"

"She implied you were, you were…" he couldn't say it. _**Psychological warfare.**_ Nicole had worked him so well.

Now Alex understood the scope of emotion. As the truth unfurled in her mind her mouth formed a wordless 'oh'. She stepped closer to his body and he scooped her in between his legs. He curved his back deeply to tuck his face into the crook of her neck, to just breathe her. Now he was coming down. Everything was okay. Relief personified.

"I shot Donny." Alex just had to get it out.

Paradise lost.

"What?"

Alex immediately felt her words wick away some of his warmth. "He came at me and Imogen. He and Nicole - at least I think it was her." she hated to think she'd been manipulated into shooting Donny. But anything was possible. A blonde of a certain height and build could have been paid to scare her into a panic reaction. And now in the aftermath it placed a wedge firmly between her and Bobby. And a bad shot could endanger her career. It might be genius.

"You had to shoot him?" Bobby asked with dismay but kept his hands on her, he couldn't let her go,_ not just yet_.

"I had to." she explained how it happened, with a little dramatic license. Just the way she was going to play it for IA if it came to that.

"What was he going for?"

"A syringe." she told him grimly "They sent it to the lab."

"Why would he do that? On a busy street like that." It was baffling.

"She can make him do anything she wants. We know the effect she has on her subordinates."

"But…"

"But nothing, Bobby let's face it, you knew Donny for a grand total of about 3 hours 7 years ago. All we know is the stock he comes from, a drug addict father and a…"

"A what?" his eyes zoomed in on her "A crazy grandmother? Is that what you were going to say."

Alex had learned to stop being hurt at the sensitivity, the defensive posture Bobby struck against her. She couldn't imagine standing up for the likes of Frank or even Frances but, Alex reminded herself, that even deeply flawed they were all he had, and everybody had a right to come from somewhere. "No I wasn't going to say that at all, I was going to say an estranged mother." she cupped his jaw.

"Oh. So no punishment after all." A loaded languid voice came from the doorway. Logan was leaning there watching, taking their loving position at face value. "I'm still here if you care, but I think I'll just go."

"No, no!" Alex tried to spring away but Bobby grabbed her hips. His grip was clear it shouted _**MINE**_.

"This is not a pissing contest." She hissed quietly prying his fingers off, using her sharp squoval nails on his flesh. "Come tell us what you have" She sat at one of the clustered seating groups and no one followed. "Both of you get over it."

"I'm over it." Logan pressed a ice pack to his jaw. "As long as he knows that next time I won't hold back."

Bobby rolled his eyes (his whole face) heavenward, "I'm over it. As long as he knows that next time he won't get up."

"Is that the best you can do." Alex looked at them both with disgust. But then miraculously they came to the table (so to speak) and sat across from one another.

It was over.

Men were strangest mammals of all.

And then Logan began to spin a strange tale.


	38. Chapter 38

"This is big." Mike magicked a brown leather satchel out of nowhere and pulled out a manilla envelope. He served it to Alex like a subpeona.

She pulled a thick folded sheaf of papers from inside it. The first page was a birth certificate. "Sarah Martin." She read the name and her brows knitted together. "Who is this?"

"Nicole Wallace." Mike said simply.

"Nicole Wallace?" Bobby's denial was immediate. "That name wasn't an alias."

"Yes it was." Mike stared him down with absolute certainty. "The real Nicole Wallace, the person born with that name, let's call her Jane Doe, was a 16 year old girl living in Sydney, Australia when she was bashed over the head and left in an alley to die. She was a street kid. She had no family connections, at least not to anyone who cared. Jane Doe was expendable. She didn't have a sheet, just a few warnings. And at 16 years and I only found one picture of her. I figure it was the birth certificate and maybe her clean sheet, that made her stand out from the other urchins and coke heads. Your Wallace, she needed that to start her new life."

"Nicole Wallace isn't exactly a unique name." Bobby poked. Every inch of his body was closed, he wasn't buying any of this. "How do you know she's the same Wallace? Virtually no ID? Seems like quite a unsubstantiated leap. "

"Wait, wait." Mike said a little annoyed. "You're getting ahead of it." He held up both hands until he could feel their eyes on his palms and he heard their mouths snap shut. "This is a story and it needs to be told like one."

"Fine do it." Alex said her voice clipped. Sweeping a hand through her hair then crossing her arms and legs until she was one tightly sealed unit.

"The year is 1960." He started in grand fashion ignoring Goren's gusty sigh and the impatient jerky adjustments he was making in his seat. "The laws across Australia were archaic. Hundreds of thousands of babies were seized from young or unwed mothers and put up for adoption. A whole generation of young women were deemed unfit to have children." He looked directly at Bobby "They were convicted without a trial. The state was a fist." Mike rotated his sore jaw in wide exaggerated circles just then, and as if he'd scripted this moment he pressed the ice bag there.

Bobby rolled his eyes at the theatrics. _**That damn wise guy.**_

"Suzanne Martin was a 17 year old girl living in Perth Australia. That's near the southern tip of the western region. She was young and unwed. On November 23rd 1960 Suzanne Martin had twins at Armadale Kelmscott Memorial Hospital. She named the first baby Amy and the second, born 2 minutes later, an identical twin girl, she named Sarah." Mike reached across Alex and flipped the page for her. There was a second birth certificate. In bold font under an official government seal from the Western Australian Registry was the name Amy Martin. Flipping between the documents Alex verified the facts. She nodded and Bobby craned a little to see, his face still impassive.

Then Alex flipped slowly to the next sheet in the wad of papers, it was adoption documentation authenticated by the Family Court of Western Australia. "They took the babies." Alex said sadly because the notion of a taken child was still so disturbing to her. Her eyes darted around for Imogen and compelled by some frantic emotion she stood quite suddenly, drawing the men's eyes upward. She went straight to her baby (never mind that Immy was napping now, never mind that Mike was speaking) she just _needed_ her child.

Alex drew back her blouse and tucked her dear fussy armful into her breast a little compulsively. Forgetting everything in that moment except maternal bliss. When she glanced over at the men they were staring. Mike's eyebrows peaked, Bobby's furrowed in concern.

"Sorry." She mumbled and brought the suckling child back to the meeting.

"Uh, um." Logan stumbled a little, riveted by the tableau of Madonna and child before him. It wasn't sexual, rather it was curiosity. He'd lived 56 years and never seen this act in the flesh. He tilted his head in serene unblinking contemplation. Watching an infant drink from their mother was captivating in it's carnal beauty.

Goren immediately misinterpreted this, he saw the education of Michael Logan as the lust of Michael Logan. He snapped his fingers a rapid **_pop pop pop_**, to gain the man's attention. Then Bobby used his index and middle to make the universal symbol for _**eyes on me**_. Mike waited for Alex to glance down at her breast and then he flipped Bobby the bird.

"Yeah they took the babies," Mike carried on. His eyes flicking to Alex's bosom twice as much because he wasn't allowed. "They didn't care about keeping siblings together or about the mother's mental health or anything really other then the states agenda."

"So… What happened?" Alex prodded oblivious to her role as the centrifugal force in their strange spinning shadow play. If she'd known what idiots they being, if she'd seen all their gesturing and posturing she would have flipped out.

"These two baby girls, these twins, were destined for tragically different paths." Mike summoned his big vision (and Goren's ire) again. "Amy Martin snagged a diaper with a golden ticket, so to speak. She was placed with Edward and Janice Ingram a wealthy old money couple. She was their only child." he gestured at the wad of papers Alex had balanced on her lap and true enough, the next one in the sequence one was an article about a hospital ward dedication: The Ingram Centre for Haematology and Oncology. It had been printed in the West Australian Newspaper dated 1964. It was a grainy depiction of a dignified looking man cutting a ceremonial ribbon and clutching the hand of a small blond girl wearing a pinafore. "The Ingram's changed Amy's name to Melissa, Melissa Ingram."

"And the other baby?" Alex asked.

"The other baby Sarah Martin was placed with Deborah and Walter Llewellyn. She stayed Sarah and took their surname." Alex riffled through the papers and found a copy of the certificate for adoption for Sarah Martin dated 1960 Perth, Australia. "They were not good people. There was abuse. There were multiple hospital reports on record, not to mention the 4 complaints filed at local PD, all from Deborah Llewellyn, all claiming physical and sexual abuse all at the hands of her husband. I can't say for sure obviously, but I'd guess that life in that house for little Sarah Martin was a nightmare. In 1978 Deborah Llewellyn was found hanging in her garage."

It was sickening in it's way. Even without images, even without intimately knowing the parties involved. Bobby and Alex just had to look at their own child and imagine.

**_You could have gone either way._ **

The words were a recurring whisper as Bobby moved through life. But at least he'd had a fighting chance. That home, the one Logan was describing, stripped away choice. There was only room for one way - if you made it out alive. Bobby felt sympathy, then the last month of his life came flooding back.

"Still with me?" Mike asked enjoying his position as master of ceremonies.

"Uh huh"Alex murmured then tucked away one glistening distended nipple. The she exposed the second turning Immy to it. Mike couldn't help but see it all. But then again, a hint of smiled played on his lips, he'd seen it all before. Once upon a time Mike thought, he was the one had left her nipples looking just that way.

"Get on with it." Goren bit out and Mike knew that Bobby had read his mind.

"It shoulda been case closed. It shoulda been a happy life for twin one, Amy Martin turned Melissa Ingram. Unfortunately Mr and Mrs. Ingram were killed in a car accident a 1990. Melissa made a break after that because she could. She was very wealthy. She was working for the municipal government. She had an undergraduate degree in English Literature from UWA - University of Western Australia. The world was her oyster. She changed her life plans and moved to the States, New York State to be exact. She came to the city. She moved around in the West Village for years. We found 3 addresses of record with the New York City Register. Then she met and married Garrett Baird and became Melissa Baird. They settled down to a modest life in Floral Park, a suburb of Long Island and had 3 kids."

"And the unfortunate twin." Alex asked.

"You." Mike looked at Goren "Asked in the beginning how I knew there was a connection between Sarah Martin and the real Nicole Wallace, a kid living on the streets in Sydney. Well flip the page." Alex did and her eyes widened it was an Op-Ed article clipping from Sydney Daily Telegraph in 1985. There was a picture of 4 smiling slightly bedraggled youths, arm, in arm, in arm, in arm. The caption said: **"Solidarity in the Streets - Staying Alive in Inner Sydney." **beside that it said **'from left to right Sarah, Nicole, Steven and Janice" **Sarah had blond hair and chocolate brown eyes and dimples. Sarah was Nicole Wallace. Beside her was Jane Doe the real Nicole Wallace. Was it a cosmic joke that in the one and only photo Mike had found she naively embraced her executioner?**  
**

"In 1979, after the death of his wife Sarah Martin's father filed a missing person's" he gestured to Alex's sheaf of documents. Alex pulled out a 29 year old report, likely scanned in the 90's in the push to make cold cases paperless. The NYPD had gone through the same transition during that decade Alex remembered. The changeover had come on the heels of stronger facsimile and computer technology "1979 was the year Sarah Martin vanished forever, but 1979 was also the year that Nicole Wallace came alive. That year there was was a flurry of activity under the name Nicole Wallace. This street kid went from off the grid to, well, to all over it. That year she acquired a health card, a social security card and a passport."

"Causal link." Goren murmured.

"Definitely." Logan supported.

And the two men shared a rare moment of professional understanding. In tacit agreement they all sat in silence and let it sink in.

All the adults anyway. Immy hadn't signed the contract. She sat up from her mothers breast and smiled at Mike and asked

"Ga? Ahhhhhru? A ga ga ga ga ga."and for a moment Mike's look transformed into a perfectly symmetrical smile just for this adorable child. He reluctantly admitted that Goren's child was adorable.

"Nicole Wallace's identity was tight as drum for years. It was stolen from a member of the forgotten class. Everything on file at 1PP about _your_ Nicole." He looked at Goren hard because Logan was a good detective and he could pick out a bugbear between a couple from a mile away.

**_He damn well knows she isn't my Nicole. _**Goren fumed.

"Everything on file" Mike continued "Born in Queensland, loser parents, a few prostitution write ups, no mugs, are details co-opted from a dead 16 year old's life."

Bobby was still struggling though. "She had a birth certificate authenticated by Australian authorities. The Department of the Attorney General sent us all of her documentation on file." He threw out.

"They also sent us a passport with her face over the name Elizabeth Hitchens. They've gotten it wrong before." Alex reminded him grimly. "There's no check or balance, there's no stop gap to protect society from someone with no boundaries."

"You're right" Mike agreed "You're exactly right. She doesn't have a conscience so she's an identity swapping genius." Mike's face reflected horrified respect. "But in the end it was simple. Wallace's whole world doesn't unlock until you have the password - Sarah Martin - her real name. It was like Rumpelstiltskin all over again." He said the last bit in a gooey voice as though he were talking straight to Immy.

"And you can't get to the password Sarah Martin, unless you first go down the Melissa Baird portal." Alex nodded seeing how they had missed it all, how it would have been impossible to get here if Nicole herself hadn't gone to Bobby and introduced herself as Melissa Baird. She had wanted a playmate. She had wanted him to know her most delicious best kept secret. She had been, not one or two, but a million steps ahead of them from the very start of this.

It was impressive.

It was disgusting.

Logan nodded enthusiastically, wanting to share his process "Melissa Baird was transparent. She never tried to hide anything. She was truly regular." A shadow passed over the former detectives' eyes. Being regular was what had made her so tragically appealing to her psychotic estranged sister. They had seen it so many times, in so many cases. Leslie Dornan, Margie Timmons, April Callaway. Alex was flooded with names of ordinary women made victims and patsies by horrible opportunists. "I went back as far as I could here in New York, public records" Mike said "then, let's just say I have a guy who's part of the 'programmer subculture' and he did the rest." Mike wasn't bound to be lawful anymore. He could use any means necessary. "Sorry we had to hack through the back door," He apologized "I don't have any boots on the ground in Oz." They nodded, both thinking 'law-smaw' whatever it took.

But Bobby was appropriately spun. He muttered to himself "How in hell…" _**Could I have missed this?**_ He tried to retrofit the name Sarah Martin onto the evil face he had come to know as Nicole Wallace. It didn't work. His brain actively fought the change. It was futile. Like some popular landmark, she would be forever branded with that name. She would always be Nicole.

"So…" Alex filled space with a single word as she tussled a little with Immy who wanted her freedom. In the seamless dance of parenting Bobby stood and scooped up his girl and jostled her around in his arms.

"So… So I don't know."Mike sighed in honesty and threw one leg across the other. "This is the kind of stuff that's never meant to be found. No one would have ever cared enough to look this deeply unless… Well unless they were you." Alex and Bobby locked eyes again, he was right, they had encountered Nicole Wallace time and time again and never once pushed beyond the documents they'd received during that first case at Hudson University. They had built every premise about her around a fallacy: that Nicole Wallace was her first identity. It had taken this, it had taken her coming into their house, literally, metaphorically. It had taken this level of torment and victimization to delve deeper.

"But one things for sure. This is how she managed to pull off the game that's had you chasing your tails for a month." He looked at Bobby with pity "and a decade." Mike gestured to the sheets. "This is how she faked her own death. This is how she's been bankrolling her revenge - a rich sister, who's dead and looks exactly like her."

Bobby and Alex clenched in synchronized discomfort. Then looked at each other. The implications were far and deep and little bit poetic.

"In short." Logan's smarmy grin was back. "You're fucked."

* * *

How did he end up here? Bobby stood in a hospital room looking down.

He was no kid.

He was a 26 year old man.

But looking at Donny pale and imperfect in that hospital bed Bobby could see why everyone had mistaken him for younger. He was gaunt. He was wasted. He'd been much healthier and full of chest as a teen. Sure he was hiding under a few days worth of beard growth and a new scar across his chin but he was small.

Bobby rubbed his own chin thoughtfully. It had been a gut shot. Donny had lost a lot of blood, hence intensive care. Part of Bobby want to scoop him into his arms and cradle his nephew like a baby. He wanted to tell him it would all be okay, Bobby wanted to heal Donny with the miraculous power of touch. Another part of Bobby wanted to remove his respirator and then plug his nose and mouth with one big heavy hand and watch him writhe and buck and then die.

Put him down like the animal he'd become.

Bobby wasn't sure which option would be better for Donny, or for his family, or for humanity.

But, since Bobby could have gone either way (his life long refrain) and because had chosen light and morality he shoved back those dark thoughts. He pulled a brown plastic seat up to his nephew's bedside and sat heavily. His face and parts of his torso were on fire with the mementos of his fight with Logan. Now he remembered why he prefered to make love not war.

_**What a strange fucking day.**_

It felt good to sit, good to rest with only the intermittent beep - proof of life - coming from the machines hooked up to Donny. He couldn't blame Alex for this. Bobby admitted now that he had never known Donny. This… this... person was just a stranger that had tried to kill his wife and child. _**Blood?**_ No. It wasn't enough anymore. He had blood relations now. Robert Goren understood exactly what true love was. He understood the feel, the taste, the smell of it. He wasn't the sad lonely man who had risked his life on a table in the bright, arid, solitary confinement unit of Tates correctional. He was no longer prepared to risk everything for the a crumb of familial connection. _**And you don't win bitch, you don't know me!**_ He sent a telepathic message to Nicole - Sarah - whoever the hell she was. _**I'm not going to blame Alex for this**_ because he knew that was exactly what Nicole wanted, angst, strife, doubt and division.

**_What a strange fucking day._**

That was the only commonality inside each day of his life now. That each one got exponentially more bizarre then the last. He didn't recognize any of the signposts anymore. He didn't know what anything meant anymore. This was his life and yet he was a foreigner in a foreign land.

**_What a strange fucking day._**

And suddenly he felt so tired. He looked at his watch, it was only 3 o'clock in the afternoon. It felt like it should be 3am - a week from now - for all the turmoil he'd faced since just this morning. He felt like he could sleep right here. And he would have if this chair had handles or offered anything remotely resembling comfort.

Instead he stood. He took one more look at Donny, his eyes drifting to the glinting metal of the handcuffs tethering this untethered soul to the bed. And then he made his way out into the hall to Alex and Immy.

He was done here.


	39. Chapter 39

**A/N: Thanks everyone for reading this winding, twisting tale and t****hank you for the great reviews. **I hope you're enjoying it. Sorry for any lulls. I've been trying hard and failing to strike a life/writing balance. Anyway, here is the next instalment and it's a doozy (lengthwise) I seem to have broken my editing bone. This chapter is also as close to fluff as I get. 

* * *

A thick ring of keys hit the console table with a _clank_ and then came the familiar _thwump_ of frame accepting door, then the ascending _clink_ of layered locks being firmly secured and the double _beep_ of the home alarm being rearmed. This was the Goren symphony of security.

Of course none of that before they'd swept every room, every closet, under every bed, every nook and cubby wide enough to contain a rat, a blonde psychotic rat or one of her minions. When Bobby gave her the thumbs up, Alex liberated Immy and watched her streak like lightning - nothing but a waggling bum and and fierce intention - across the wood floor and striped rug to a riotous rainbow of toys. Alex smiled. Their daughter moved so fast on all fours that she might opt out of walking altogether.

"It's good to be home." He let the cliche trip off his tongue.

"Sooo good."

Oh what she would give to never leave. The world felt like such a hostile place right now. He glanced at the clock, it was just after 7pm on the longest day in history. He pulled his decimated phone out of his pants pocket and rested it on the kitchen island.

"We'll have to get my old one out of the junk drawer until that's replaced." she gestured at the shattered device. They couldn't afford to be out of contact right now.

"I'll get a request in to tech tomorrow." The phone was work issue, thank God, they also couldn't afford another expense.

Alex busied herself with the task of drawing curtains and lowering blinds. Even three stories up surveillance would be no challenge to a motivated lunatic with a high powered lens. So everyday when the sun sank into the horizon it summoned them to batten down the hatches. The second order of business was to _get comfortable_ and that's just what they all did. Immy getting a quick once over with a washcloth and straight into her pink and turquoise sleeper. Then mom and dad slipping into their home-drobe. For him: drawstring plaid pyjama pants and a black t-shirt. And for her: leggings, which she hoarded in every possible pattern and colour. Tonight Alex pulled out the cocoa ones. She imagined them warming her up just like the beverage. She capped them with a loose cream long sleeved tee **_the whipped topping_** she thought fancifully. And the final omission? Socks. Nothing but bare feet would do.

Then they reconvened in the living room. Immy making the whole space her playzone. Pulling up and touching everything.

"War room?" she heard Bobby rumble from the kitchen.

"No." She closed her eyes and pressed a troubled hand to her forehead. "Please let's just pretend none of it exists. I don't want to think about _her_ or what Logan said or it's applications or what I did." **_Donny. Shooting Donny._** They both knew she meant Donny. Even a righteous shoot was a painful one. And this one was so horribly complicated.

His nod was short.

Bobby was glad to just be. He didn't feel any negativity toward Alex about the days events. Maybe it was latent, maybe like her anger at his lie, it would spring up fierce and dark in the future, but today he felt at peace. Alex had done them (and Donny) a favour by separating him from Nicole. Maybe now he had a fighting chance. _**If he lives **_a voice haunted and he shut it down.

Bobby had only shot one suspect in his career, back in 1993 during his time in Narcotics. He still remembered that sickly ever-present feeling. He knew the demons his wife was battling. He remembered that afterward, even during those rare moments of levity when he managed to forget himself - to have a nice lunch or a good nights sleep - the NYPD was like an elephant, forever keeping tally.

This afternoon he had stood by Alex as she gave 2 hours worth of interviews and statements. The investigations would now proceed to the SIU (a division of IA) and then in the worst case it would be handed off to the DA. It was a real mess an on-duty shooting. Alex would be under huge amounts of pressure for the foreseeable future. Bobby greatly wished he could take that from her. She'd been through enough. _**Damn you Nicole**_. So yeah, with all this pinging uncomfortably around in his head he was grateful to just percolate and to not mar the serenity of the apartment with words.

While he puttered in the kitchen, Alex cleared her disturbed mind by decluttering. Reshelving a few books that were on the floor, bringing a mug with dregs of cold coffee to the kitchen sink, returning the newspapers and magazines to the mid-century modern credenza, then sliding the door shut on the whole mess. Then on came the lamps. Alex loved lamps and their warm ocherous glow. It felt that in their keen luminescence, nothing else existed. It felt like the world ended with their small family. With the turn of each knob the warmth grew until it enveloped everything. It played at the ceiling creating a cosy tented effect, then it spread over to the routed details of their century moulding softening them, it bent round the tubular metal legs of their couch and bounced playfully off the face of their perfectly round brass mirror. It danced around 497 books, turning their spines into rows of homogenous sticks. And then, only then did the light affect it's most wondrous feat of all, it fell upon the occupants and magically it smoothed away fine human lines, restored the intrinsic healthy glow to skin and enchanted all to forget everything beyond it's influence. This was the love that only home could give.

"Hungry then?" Bobby asked from inside the fridge.

"Starving." Alex said on a groan of epicurean need.

And he knew she meant food, of course, but the tone of her voice raked over him and made parts of him stand at attention. She did it for him every single time. It didn't matter how disastrous or dire the circumstance, she was always what he wanted. He turned and let his eyes lock on her slender form as she dipped and bent to the task of tidying, her hair piled on top of her head in thick tousled bun, soft tendrils caressing her neck and ears. Now that her tresses reached the middle of her back, by the evening the tumultuous locks were a force to be reckoned with and she always tamed them this way.

Bobby had found while getting to know her over the last two years, _the real her_ not just Eames, that this was incarnation he loved best, Alex all peachy and peaceful and utterly relaxed at home. He was still watching her, when, like a teen, she flopped down to the floor cross legged and to Immy's delight began to build a tower with interlocking blocks.

"Can you fit that one on?" He listened to the maternal kindness in her voice "Oh… oh not quite. Almost, almost… oh you did it!" She gave a small clap of excitement as the little girl mastered coordination and dexterity to add a red block without toppling their creation. And because mommy clapped so did Immy, and she screeched with glee.

Bobby watched his wife some more with lust and fascination. What a delicate creature he had married. In two short movements Alex was lying on her belly, head propped on one hand. Bobby watched. Her toes waved in the air. He followed the line legs right to the curve of her bum. Those pants, they left nothing to the imagination.

Then he was moving, then he was standing over her, ogling her.

Alex looked way up from her toy tower quite oblivious and smiled. "Coming to play daddy?" She asked on Immy's behalf but the innocence of the statement was lost on him.

Before he knew it, he had given in to the lure of the floor as well, only more gingerly. He was still a little creaky and a little sore. He sat alongside Alex pressing into her, sharing warmth through proximity. He smoothed a hand over her thigh tracing _up, up, up_ the seam. Along cleft of her cheeks then right into the dimple of her spine. He rubbed slowly, evenly, beneath her shirt. To Alex his touch was like someone pouring hot buttered rum into the chunks of granite that had formed in her muscles. She rewarded him with a gentle moan. His fingers contracted. A certain part of his anatomy was granite as well. He tried to speak normally. "We can do takeout. Or I can... I can... make something simple." There was some cooked chicken breast from yesterday, add some bouillon and chopped veg and he was sure they would end up with a passable stew.

"You sure?" she raised her brows "You look like all you need is a bag of frozen peas over your face and your feet up on the couch." His cheek and outer eye were getting angrier with each passing moment and on his lip was a blackening line of clotted blood.

"I can think of something else I need." His gaze was hot. **_She is hot_**.

She caught his meaning. Her smile was interested but her words were sassy. "Anger management classes?"

Alex rolled onto her back to look into his eyes, but he was too busy looking at the outline of her breasts and the bit of flesh revealed by her raised and twisted shirt. He let idle fingers trace small hearts on the skin below her belly button.

"You think I'm an idiot." he said.

"No" she tucked a folded arm behind her head, "you're just another unfortunate victim of testosterone." She grinned. "Like those meatheads that sell looseys and headlock each other outsida bodegas." she said innocently. "You just need track pants and some bling."

He tried to hold back his smile. "You think you're so funny."

"I know I'm funny." she shot back, knocking his arm affectionately with her knee.

Something passed over his eyes. And rather abruptly he asked, "Did you love him?" His long fingers sunk into the meat around her hip bone.

"Who?" She frowned she couldn't even imagine.

"Mike."

She trained her body to be still and her nose not to snort. _**Loved Mike Logan? Yeah right.**_ "We shouldn't talk about former…" she trailed off and looked away because she didn't want get into the truth about the why's of her dalliance with Mike.

"Just answer." He implored and they sat and lay there for a long time eyes eating into one another, then finally she gave in.

"It was just sex. I had an itch that needed..."

He made a face "Okay I get it." It was harder to hear because it was Logan, someone he'd worked shoulder to shoulder with.

"I don't think you _do_ get it." she said.

"I'm sorry I asked. Let's stop." he rubbed his face wearily.

"No." she murmured sitting up so slowly that she felt each vertebra peel away from the floor "I think I want to say this." It was a struggle for her to be this honest but Bobby was her heart, he was her soul, she didn't need to posture here. She didn't need to be reserved or cool. She straddled his outstretched legs, kneeling over his lap."It was..."

He turned away and she turned him back. His look said, _**Come on don't make me listen to this.**_ But she wouldn't stop. "It was after Testarossa," she lowered onto him, settling heavily, holding his twitchy frame still with her weight. He was so aroused beneath her, she hadn't expected that.

"It was the first time I thought…" she stalled. "It was the first time I really thought that you didn't need me." Her face cinched in pain. "I was there at Major case, everyday, alone for months, fending off Ross with his 'new partner' talk, watching your seat like you'd miraculously appear, counting the seconds..." She had never been this honest with anyone, ever. Admitting her frailty eye to eye was so raw and so intimate. "And then, and then you were there at the end of my gun. And I found out you had all this stuff going on, you were working with the Chief and the Captain and Stoat and Testarossa and clearly you had moved on and clearly you were doing just fine on your own."

"Alex..." she pressed a soft finger to his lips.

"And it was like... It was like being hit in the face with something. I realized I was the only one. I needed you so much more then you needed me." She took a sharp breath. "Anyway Mike was there." Bobby tensed beneath her. "He wanted me and I wanted you but..." she shrugged "he got the job done."

His fingers branded her, they pressed so far in that she squeaked a little "You're, you're hurting me..." he released her immediately.

"Sorry. It's just... it's just... That last part was like taking a bullet."

"So now you know." She said. "I'm not even sure I liked Mike, let alone loved him, I mean he's cute..."

"Stop!" Bobby barked rolled beneath her causing her slender back to wave like a reed in the wind. "I was an idiot back then. I was lost and so stupid. I loved you." he gazed right up into her eyes, "I have loved you for so long."

"You don't have to..." she searched out Immy, her little distraction, she couldn't bear it if lied to make her feel better. Besides their daughter might be playing with knives or trying to stick something in an outlet for all the attention she was getting. But Immy wasn't, she sitting about 10 feet away with a mini soccer ball in her lap.

Now it was his turn to be honest. He used fingertips to draw her back. "Listen to me. I know the exact moment I realized that I loved you." He knew the exact second. "But I'm not like you Alex. Knowing wasn't enough. I didn't understand what to _do_ with it."

"Bobb..."

"No" he cut her off, he tucked an arm around her waist. "I'm not as good as you. I'm not as open and loving, but you're making me better."

"You're fine..." she started because she always did this, she always lifted him up.

"No. I'm not fine, I'm deficient." He said "If I was whole I would have told you then, instead I hurt you for years when I loved you... I loved you the second you told me what you were doing for Liz."

He remembered it so clearly they were in 'their' Diner.

**He was eating pastrami on rye and she was picking at a pasta salad. Suddenly she said,**

**"I'm leaving."**

**And he said "For the day?"**

**"No." and the weight of the word made him put down his sandwich. "Just for a couple a months, I'm pregnant." she smiled and he felt his world spiral, everything got narrow and dark, he might pass out in his pastrami.**

**"Who's the guy? The dad." he demanded, this was so jolting.**

**"Congratulations Eames?" she said sardonically giving him a sidelong glance. That was what a co-worker _should_ say.**

**But he wasn't capable of pleasantries, something inside him was dying. Hope? "Who's the guy?" he demanded again.**

**"No guy." A secret played on her lips. "Just me, a doc and a turkey baster."**

**He scoffed, which was rude, but he was so shocked that he was letting it all hang out. _If she wanted a kid that bad she coulda asked me_ the inappropriate thought rose up before he could stop it. And he immediately looked down at his sandwich frowning trying to understand why the hell he would think something like that.**

**"For my sister." she put him out of his misery. "This is for Liz and Bill. She needs me Bobby. She's losing hope, something is dying in her. She really, really needs me." her eyes were glossy.**

**And looking at her he nodded. And then he looked inside her, in that moment and he saw who she was. He understood the integrity, the warmth, the love that lived in the bones of this woman. This was all he'd ever wanted. Someone to love him that much. God she knew how to _love_. He thought of Frank and was swamped with disappointment. Being around Alexandra Eames was like a masterclass in what family should be. He was so glad to be her friend.**

**"Congratulations Eames." He said softly. "This is a great thing you're doing."**

And then he was back. And this wasn't a dream, she was here and he had her and he didn't have to wait another second. "Being away from you for those 8 weeks were the most uncomfortable, unhappy time of my life. I made mistakes, I couldn't sleep. I thought about you all the time. It was a craving. But then just when I was about to snap, just when I was about to spill it all to you, you came back and I had you again."

"Not in every way." she wished he'd had her this way back then. She wished that they could have made a houseful of kids together.

He kissed her short and moist "Well you might have been part of a pornographic fantasy or two." _**Or a million.**_ He admitted. "You were the woman none of the others could live up to."

She frowned searching his face to see if it were true, to see if this was some revisionist history, if his guilt was making him spin the past.

"Baby, it's the truth." he whispered "If we hadn't been partners, we would have been lovers."

She thought about it. He might be right. The partnership had been so emotionally fulfilling, so consistent, so round the clock. It had done better then most marriages, a dozen plus years. And for those after hours needs? Those needs of the flesh? They'd both found lame surrogates to pay the sexual debt.

Years of denial.

But not anymore.

He grabbed her mouth and she his. The sloppy slip and slide of desire. She wrapped her arms around his neck. He raised his hips against her and she rode him. Then he was kneading and squeezing her rear, pulling her soft parts tight to his hard ones.

"I think I like you jealous." she said against his tongue, sliding her mouth down his neck.

"Do you now."

"It's so hot." She whispered in his ear a stream of liquid sex. "You're so strong. You make me feel like a woman. He's nothing, you're everything. I love your hands on my ass. I love it when you touch me. Any hole you want tonight."

He groaned, _this was working._ God this was amazing.

She gripped and raised the hem of his black t-shirt and striped him. Then she saw them, the bruises, three darkening areas across his chest and ribs, she let her fingers skim them. "Poor baby." she leaned in and kissed each raw spot, then her mouth followed the line of hair down his chest, as it thinned. She tongued him and sucked gently. She wanted to devour him. Then she scooched down lower to his abs. She moved her tongue on his skin rimming his navel.

"Alex." he moaned parting his legs a little in anticipation as her head got closer to, well, to head.

Then through a haze of sexual subservience Alex knew they were being watched.

**_Immy!_**

The infant stood there a foot away holding onto the sofa's edge. She made a shaky transition to them gripping her mothers shirt to stay upright. And in a disturbing bit of mimicry the baby planted her mouth on her father's shoulder. Bobby and Alex looked at each other faces twisted in mortified mirth. And after five full beats they both dissolved into fits of laughter. Yes, they had forgotten about their daughter and yes, they had been about to scar her for life. Alex buried her face in the crook of Bobby's neck shaking with peals of laughter and crying tears of hilarity.

"Oh my God." she crowed into his flesh.

"We are the worst parents on the planet." he said between hoarse hoots. Then in one fluid motion he swept their sweetheart into the gap between them fitting her warm against his chest. "You didn't see a thing." he told Immy looking into her brown doe eyes, using the power of suggestion.

"Quite the education today" Alex giggled "what between the gunshot and the fist fight and" Alex covered her daughters ears and mouthed "and a near blowjob." They both dissolved in ruckus chuckles.

"Most streetwise baby in the 'Mommy and Me' class." Bobby sniffed away tears of joy. He kissed his daughter soundly and softly on her forehead. "We love you." he told her and she laughed, so he buried his face in her tummy and growled, "Love you, love you, love you," embracing his silly daddy monster.

* * *

They watched her from the bedroom door. The glow from the hallway casting over her small body giving her an aura. There was an indescribable peace, _a rightness_, at the end of a long day when your child was fed and fast asleep. This was Imogen's first night in the crib since the kidnapping. And how appropriate, tactically speaking, they had launched a successful strike against Nicole's army today, with Mike's intel they just might win this war.

"Look at what we made." Bobby could hardly believe it most days. _He had a daughter._

"Two flawed people managed perfection." She smiled.

"And she's a little more perfect now that she's sleeping."

Alex laughed, lulled by his normal facade, only to be a victim of stealth. He bent casually low and in one motion tucked into her waist and slung her over his shoulder in a fireman carry. She pounded on his back and he turned his head and kissed her ass.

"Where do you want to be taken?" he demanded though he had somewhere in mind.

"Neanderthal." She shot out.

"Did you know that people of European and Asian descent today retain Neanderthal DNA that may affect their hair, skin, fertility as well as their predisposition to certain diseases." He reamed off the barely relavant information like a living textbook as he moved down the hall.

"Yes I did, Mr. Know It All." She twisted and thrashed a bit but his hands were manacles.

And then he was hefting her down and the brief sensation of falling was offset by the comfort of his arms. And she was back, on the floor as though they'd never left, but this time in a bed of blankets and throws and pillows and even her faux fur rug, basically the contents of their linen closet right there in front of the fireplace. And there was a fire roaring despite the fact that the air conditioning was on. It was July afterall.

"You romantic devil, when did you do this?" she asked from her place supine in mess of cushions and cloth.

"While you were feeding."

"Well come here." She spread her arms and legs wide and he did, crawling over her. Fitting right into her double grip, feeling her clasp him all over. And then they were kissing and then she got the upper hand, sitting astride him and without preamble she went straight for his waistband.

"Hey, whoa…" he startled. She instantly had his drawstring open and then her hands were deep inside his pants. She grasped two handfuls of turgid, straining flesh. And he moaned his pleasure. And then he felt the cool air of exposure. And then that cool air became the hot moist cavern of her mouth. "Oh God Alex." he cried as he watched her blond head bob up and down and felt her lips firmly around him.

He wanted this and yet he didn't. He also wanted the joy of spreading her, of looking into her folds, of teasing her with his tip. He wanted to feel himself slicing through the layers of her fleshy defenses. He wanted to feel his member work up against her walls and soak in her juices. But she had him on the edge. He was about to come. He felt the involuntary clenching of buttocks, the raising of his hips to heaven, his breath coming short and choppy. It was like rape, his body had raped his will.

"Alex. Ahhhhhh"

He finished.

He couldn't stop the gush of fluid. She took it and him deep into the well of her throat pulling hard with lips and air until he was totally spent.

"Bitch." he muttered lost in that haze between black and bliss, wake and sleep. The floppy, flacid reminder of her sexual supremacy lying damp on his thigh.

"You'll get over it." She leaned low and whispered "And then you'll get over me."

And that was sort of how it happened.

* * *

It wasn't until the clock chimed eleven (after some lolling and some napping) that he got up over her. Still lying on that same pile of bedding and rugs she willingly spread to let his body press into hers. He hitched her leg up around his hip and went for gold. Rowing and rocking with her beneath him. And she pulled his panting mouth down to hers kissing him deeply.

"Protection." she murmured because they were doing it again, playing with fire. She was still fertile. In fact right now she was most fertile. He had a radar for these things. Maybe pheromones or maybe she'd given him a come hither look or maybe it was the smell of her. He'd always had an impressive nose.

"Forget it. I want another one." His voice was strained.

"What!?" she gasped from beneath him, from around him.

He kept thundering into her, playing his game of russian roulette with her womb. And she kept clinging. She kept mewling.

"We're too old."

"I don't feel old." he grunted on another thrust, pinning her arms over her head, then scissoring her bare legs between his for maximum _squeeze._ She felt him slide against the length of her both inside and out.

"We need to talk about this." she moaned and then there were no more words.

* * *

They lay naked and spent when the rumble of tummies pushed them to the kitchen. Stew wasn't on the menu any more, only a picnic of cold chicken and baguette from the bread box torn into chunks and smeared with butter, and cheeses - his stinky one along with her brie and some sliced up American cheddar for good measure. They also piled on a jar of olives because she wanted something salty and a jar of peppers because he want something hot and some grapes for something sweet. All of it was served up on a platter and washed down with a half a bottle of Rosé passed between them without the nicety of a glass. And no plates or forks were invited either just fingers and freedom and fun.

He grabbed the chicken from her mouth under the guise of a kiss and she fought to the death for the last grape.

Then he stopped in the middle of their nonsensical battles and cupped her face with both palms, holding his greasy fingertips away and said. "God._ I love you._"

"I love you too."

And they were silent, basking in mutual love.

And because she knew him better then anyone she saw that suddenly he was calculating and then considering and then on a slight frown deducing.

"What?" She asked zeroing in. "What is it?"

"I know where she is." He pulled the thought from nowhere. "I know how to get Nicole."


	40. Chapter 40

He never thought he'd lay eyes on this place again.

Yet he'd made the 40 minute drive upstate to be here. It was fine, cathartic even, to push back the hands of time, to leave the city all alone in his Mustang just as he had in another life. His last visit here had been late autumn. A fitting bit of symbolism as it had also been the autumn of her life. Back then the verdant grounds of this place had been fading to the ash and fallow of winter.

But today this place reflected the current season of his life. The landscape was lush and generous. It was the heart of summer and the grounds were a masterpiece. Masses of grasses swayed in the breeze. The great clumpy balls were like the head of a lion tossing it's shaggy mane. And the huge boulders artfully placed beside formed the beast's curved basking body. On every garden bed were bursts of yellow and purple and white flowers. The signature colours of their logo. And off as far as the eye could see were bending, undulating fields of emerald green marked with the wide linear tracks of a ride on mower.

Amidst the manicured beauty Bobby's stomach churned.

He pulled up to a small white house with a pitched roof (a house just big enough for a single bored man). He rolled to a stop at the barrier arm. If Bobby had believed in omens the blocked path would have sent him running but he didn't, he couldn't afford to. In no time the guard jerked upright from his book or maybe a nap. He pulled his crossed soles down from their place on the window sill. Then he smiled and flicked a switch. The arm lifted and he waved Bobby through. The security was mostly for show, Bobby should know he had driven under this arm hundreds of times before.

He rolled past a stone marker set on a knoll above the road. It was engraved with the name of the institution: **Carmel Ridge Centre for Mental Health and Addiction**. Today the purple slate looked like a tombstone and the words on it an epitaph. He took a deep steadying breath and edged the Mustang slowly past, strictly observing the black and white signs requesting '15 MPH.' It was no hardship to slow down today, he wished he could stop altogether. Too soon he arrived at the low large building (built circa 1950) and he swung wide into a visitors parking spot.

Now that he was here, now that he was standing on the asphalt beside his car Bobby smiled in spite of himself, how could he not? Yes this was where he'd lost his mom, but this was also where they had talked and visited and connected for the last decade of her life. He had loved her here. He had hated her here. And he had (aptly) questioned his own sanity here. God she'd been such a bitch to him, he could see that now. But he'd kept coming back, he'd almost bankrupted himself trying to hold onto her. That had to be the definition of insanity.

As he moved slowly up the front walk the memories were a deluge, drenching him, the sky opened up and poured recollections all over him. He moved through the front door and that smell hit him - he sucked deep - a mix of antiseptic and lunch and mature walls, it was all the same. He moved to the front desk and placed his hands there and waited patiently lost in his inner world.

His mad as a hatter mother had driven every member of the staff nuts. She had been a demanding, bell ringing tyrant. She had dressed down everyone from nurses to janitors to (on one unfortunate day) the mailman. **_Good old ma. _**Her favourite accusations were that they'd stolen her millions or were trying to inject her with the devil. But Frances Goren had also found moments of profound lucidity here at Carmel Ridge. She had helped run the **Books on Wheels** program. She could turn one sharp hawkish eye on anyone and hand them the book that would touch their soul. That had been her gift, on her good days anyway. Francis had had a fair many more of those 'good days' toward the end, because (and this was just Bobby's speculation) because that was the way of human bodies. We insignificant many were a microcosm of the universe - as one problem swelled inside our cells all the others receded in respect. The cancer had taken so much energy from Frances that most days she hadn't the time or inclination for delusions. Perhaps that was the craziest thing of all that the Cancer cured her, made her his mom again and allowed her to leave the planet on a charitable note helping fellow residents rekindle their love of reading.

After his post-coital epiphany with Alex yesterday, Bobby had called Carmel Ridge to confirm his suspicions about Nicole. They were expecting him today. He was shown straight to the site administrator's office, a woman he knew well. Marjorie O'Neill. She had held this position for the last 16 years.

"Mr. Goren we've been expecting you." Mrs. O'Neill greeted him warmly. "You're looking good. How have you been?"

He smiled and shuffled and said "Thanks. Good. Very Good."

She smiled back warmly, "We miss you on the ward." Bobby hadn't realized he'd made such a lasting impression, but he supposed he'd been here week in and week out, year in and year out and supposed he did take up a lot of physical space. "We miss Frances." she said softly.

"So do I." And like a child for few brief moments he just wanted his mommy. The sentiment was fleeting and like the little boy he'd once been he grew up.

"What can we do for you?" She perched on the corner of the desk kicking the air lightly with sensible shoes.

"I understand you have another Goren on the ward."

"We do. Sarah. We asked if she was related but…"

"No. No relation." _**Only in her dreams.**_ "I - I'd like to see her if I could."

The woman turned picked up the receiver of her black desktop phone. She tapped out an extension, the information came quickly, she replaced the receiver in the cradle.

"Sarah's in treatment, but you can walk down and talk to the nurse on duty. She'll let you know how long it will take."

"Okay."Bobby smiled and turned to leave. "And Marjorie? In case I don't see you again," She lifted her brows in question. "Thank you for your dedication."

* * *

**_Oh you cruel bitch._**

Bobby thought as he was directed to room 53B, the very room in which his mother had died.

It was horribly perfect.

_**How had she managed it?**_

He entered to find he was alone. He poked around some, did some detecting, some sleuthing because _that_ was in his blood. He fondled the trappings of 'Sarah Goren's' life laid out all around him. Her institutionally small closet was full of big designer names. Her lotions and potions and beautification regime adorned a table that some might use for more practical applications like medications and meals. Her perfume (he couldn't resist bringing the frosted glass bottle to his nose) took him back in ways nothing else had thus far. Scent, it was the seat of the memory and she had worn this particular odeur for as long as he'd known her. It was light and feminine and expensive smelling, no doubt sold by the ounce in some Parisian boutique. You could take the girl out of the mansion but you couldn't take the mansion out of the girl. _**Or wait, wasn't that out of the slums, then out of the prisons, then out of the mansion.**_ His lips quirked. He had to admit Sarah had done good. Her name was fluid but her identity was firm. It was hard to imagine her as anything but poised and polished. He couldn't conceive of her scrabbling for food and shelter.

And then suddenly he wasn't alone anymore.

"Bobby." he had never heard his name said quite so warmly.

"Nicole." his voice was cool. "Or do you prefer Sarah?"

"I've been trying Sarah on but I think I'll always have an affection for Nicole."

She talked about her personas like people. Then he reminded himself that they were, each one stolen from an unsuspecting innocent, even Sarah, what had that poor baby ever done to deserve this woman?

"Go with what's comfortable I guess." He muttered.

"I wondered when you would find me. I left you so many clues."

"Well forgive me. I would have been here sooner but I was busy fearing for my family, for my life,_ for my everything_." he said sharply.

"But you're here now and that's all that matters." She smiled warmly. The rouge in her cheeks giving her face that comely configuration so coveted by modern women. "Where are the sirens? Where is the takedown? Where is your snippy little side arm?" Alex she meant Alex.

"I wanted to talk."

"No cavalry at all?" She was surprised "Not even a little pistol in your pocket?"

He patted himself heavily around the chest, waist and hips. "Just me."

"I'm chuffed to bits you're here. I've missed you." she said.

"I've missed you too." She searched his face for the tells, the ones that always accompanied a lie, but he was perfectly neutral.

"How's our girl?" she asked.

His brow furrowed.

"Imogen."

"She's well." he smiled deeply. Thinking of his daughter always made him smile.

"And your wife?" All of her good will evaporated on the word wife. She said it said it like refuse or vomit.

"She isn't very happy with me right now." Bobby said. "I figured out where you were and I insisted on coming to see you alone."

"Honestly Bobby. I don't know how you put up with someone so… so provincial."

"How does she put up with me is a better question. This has been a stressful month and a half." he admitted "I don't think she can take much more. I think this is it for us."

"You _don't_ _need_ _her_. That was my point all along. She can't help you." Nicole looked at him. "That brain of yours is like a TARDIS infinite in it's capacity. Why you would go and tether it to that mediocrity…"

Bobby could see it now. She hated Alex. Absolutely hated her. This was new. In all of their interactions over the years Nicole had never treated his partner as anything more then an insignificant irritant. Of course back then Alex hadn't been his wife. Gyson was right, this was all about him.

"I have a lot of avenues for expanding my mind Nicole."

"Yes Bobby, but do you have the right woman?" She moved toward him hips swaying in tight denim. "Never underestimate the benefit of choosing the right life partner."

"How would you know?" he shot out.

"Touchè."

"Anyway, I'm legally bound to the woman I'm with."

She scoffed, "We all make mistakes. I've found that an impulsive match isn't a death sentence. Just move on. That's what lawyers are for."

"Do you mean Rohan or Gavin or maybe Garrett."

"Garrett." her laugh was like the tinkling of ivories "Garrett wasn't _my_ mistake."

"He was Melissa's? Your sister's?"

"Well done Bobby. Well done." She gave him a brief ovation "Finally we're all on the same page."

"I was at a disadvantage. I had decades to work through. The red tape of three countries on three separate continents. Figuring out all your twists and turns Nicole er .. uh… Sarah is a full time job. You're quite the chameleon."

"I spelled it out for you a month ago." She looked on him with displeasure. "You didn't want to believe. But you do now."

"What are you doing here Nicole? What are you doing in this place?" he gestured broadly at his mother's room. "You should be on the other side of the world, you should have already disappeared."

"Respite Bobby. Everyone needs a mental health day occasionally." She sauntered over to the window and looked out at the grounds. "I see why you kept your mummy here. It's very good for the soul. Of course I can leave whenever I wish." She told him.

The silence was heavy then he asked

"Why did you take my daughter?"

"I was trying her on for size." she glowed her face alight with delusion.

"You were trying to torture us." he shot back.

"I haven't been a mother in a long while."

"She has a mother."

Nicole whirled on him and gave him a look one part anger, one part pity. "No one will hold that genetic flaw against her." She said. "I thought you'd come around Bobby. I thought that was why you were here. I thought you could see now."

"What?" his eyes drilled into hers.

"That we should be together. Don't be obtuse. It doesn't suit you." She crossed her arms. "Isn't this what the last decade had been about? One extended session of foreplay?" She moved closer, then closer, then closer still until the groove of her lips angled into the bow of his. But she didn't touch him, not yet. "All the failed affairs for both of us. They just weren't the _right_ affair."

"You want me?" Something in him was still genuinely fighting that notion.

"We're peas in a pod." He could feel her warm breath on his mouth. "We don't have anyone. We don't play by the rules. We don't have to be confined by simple things and simple people. We can do anything. _We can be anything_."

At those words he felt a rush.

This danger felt good.

"Like giants straddling the world." he said.

"You sound like Freemont."

"It's a direct quote."

"He was good. You could be extraordinary."

And in that statement Bobby understood Nicole's allure. He understood what it was that made strays and billionaires alike flock to her, push and shove one another to gain entry to her sphere of influence. She had raw charisma, and like a current it flowed from her and gripped him. "I watched you," she whispered, "on the dias at the FBI" She let her lips hover millimetres from his ear. "I watched all those people. They were riveted by you, they followed your every movement like you were a God." She took a step closer and now their clothing was touching the electro charged hair of her beige cashmere sweater rubbing the buttons on his navy blue blazer.

"Our relationship has always been…" he searched for a word. "Adversarial. Now suddenly I appeal to you? Why?"

"You've always challenged me. I've enjoyed our games." she said casually.

"It's more then that." he insisted.

"Time." She said. "Time is not infinite."

Now he felt 'chuffed' because he finally_ understood_. Every action, every move she'd made for the last 2 months became transparent. This was Nicole in a death spiral. This was Nicole's version of taking stock of her life. She was going after what she wanted in spectacular fashion and he was on her bucket list. The thought both intrigued and terrified him.

"What do you have in mind?" He paused "For us." Against judgement and reason he really was curious.

"Proof." The word was a puff on his face, then she stepped back three paces. This woman was no idiot. She was discerning. She wasn't just going to trust that he'd flipped to the dark side after years of fighting for good. That would be like the missionaries suddenly joining the savages.

"What kind of proof?" His pulse rate kicked up.

"Who do you have left." She sing songed, "Eeny meeny miny mo." She ticked a finger between two invisible parties. "The wife and the best friend." Lewis she was talking about Lewis. And Bobby had a moment of panic. Her hit list only had two more souls on it and she wanted him to Judas one for her slaughter or worse do it himself.

"I can't." He confessed. "_I_ have a conscience." He let some of his old bite bleed through because he knew she would expect that. She would expect him to be a little mean.

"Morality is so quaint." she scoffed. "You just pull it out and use it as needed whenever you wish." And then she advanced on him again but this time she didn't stop. "Have you ever wondered Bobby? Wondered what it would be like to…" And she pressed her lips to his. And he found that she didn't taste evil. She tasted of peppermint and aggression. She pulled back. "It helps if you join in."

And he did.

He kissed her. He kissed her in a way he hadn't kissed any woman besides Alex in almost 3 years, with tongue and enthusiasm. He kissed his nemesis, standing on his mother's grave, inside a mental institution - Hollywood couldn't have scripted it better. But for Bobby it wasn't a fog of passion, he was hyper aware of the kiss, of the closeness of her face, of the wet sounds of their lips and the position of her body. But he realized too late that Nicole Wallace wasn't a lady anymore. All of her doe eyed denials and feigned innocence of years past were gone. Today the gloves were off.

Intellectually Bobby knew that in matters of sex Nicole could do anything, be anyone, without a seconds hesitation. She had cultivated a mind/body schism. She could keep her wits and act in unimaginable ways. He knew that she had engaged in sex for murder and gain in Thailand. He knew she had taken lovers of all races and ages and genders. He knew all these things because he'd read them, he'd sat in a swivel chair under fluorescent lights and flipped through the stapled white sheets of her file. But he had never _seen_ her do it.

He had never seen her flick that switch of civility to 'off' and roll in the gutter.

He had never seen any of the dirty little acts she could preform.

He had never witnessed Nicole the prostitute.

Not until today.

She kissed him and pressed her body hard against his. So hard that it felt flat and featureless like an insistent slab of something. Then she reached low and cupped him and squeezed him through his pants.

"What are you doing?!" he grabbed her hands but she broke his hold roughly.

"Giving you what you want. What all men want."

He laughed in shock. He swallowed hard. Suddenly he felt very foolish for thinking he could run a game on someone like this. 'No' did not mean 'no' with her. She was single minded in what she wanted. She pressed a hard mouth to his and grabbed him again, she used a well placed elbow to slam him back against the wall.

"Nicole!" he barked trying to… to what? Snap her out of it? How naive.

She was very good at her craft. Her manipulations got the physiological changes she desired. He lengthened and hardened.

"I imagined what this would be like and you have exceeded expectations." she complimented his physical endowments.

"Not here." he urged taking a different tack. Rather then reject her outright and incur her wraith he offered the promise of more somewhere else. "Stop Nicole!"

Mistake number 2. 'Stop' was like a invitation to this woman. Nicole Wallace fed on dread.

In a blink his fly was down and she had her fingers inside the hole.

"Stop!" He grabbed her shoulders and they tousled a little. He shoved her back but she only wanted one thing his vulnerable flesh and she got it. His breath caught. It was surreal and _so_ real at once. Her touching him this way. His power stick in her unstable hand. She won because now every struggle had her twisting him, _hurting him._

His eyes were wide. He pled. "Careful, careful!" His breath came in short terrified puffs. He cupped his hand over hers and held it in place around his erection. "I can't do this here." His voice was low. "My mother… my mother died here." He didn't hope for compassion, she had likely danced on her own mother's grave (if she hadn't put her in it). If he wanted her to stop he should have encouraged her, he should have debased her with dirty words and moaned loudly, told her he liked Daddy's little whore. But he wasn't thinking, he was panicking. "I _can't_ do this here."

"I think you can." She murmured and her hand began sliding up and down in a tight perfect rhythm. He knew in that moment that she didn't want anything to do with him, or his pleasure or even his body. This was about power. She want to bring forth his basest needs. She wanted to steal something precious from Alex. "Enjoy it." She demanded.

"No! Jesus Nicole." he gripped her hair like a clump of dirty rope and snapped her head back, "Jesus Nicole get off me!" But she smiled. She actually smiled from that twisted brutalized position. She barely lost rhythm. She had a goal. She wanted ejaculate, she wanted sticky proof of her supremacy. And he tried to stop it, but he couldn't,_ just he couldn't._ He oozed thick and white down the back of her hand.

Then she dropped his limp package like nothing.

She stepped back. And her eyes, he would never forget the look in her eyes. Vacant. Dead.

And he stood there and the shame came rolling in.

He whipped around and slammed his head into the wall. What had he done? What had he let her do? He couldn't right his clothes fast enough. He tried to regain himself, to stay the plotted course, but he felt disgusting. He felt his lunch come up into his mouth. He swallowed it down again.

"Come with me." he said at last still looking at the wall.

"Where?" her voice was wary.

"A mo... A motel. So we can do this properly." His voice was hollow.

"I have a somewhere in mind." she said suddenly.

He nodded.

* * *

"I've always wanted to ride in this car." Nicole ran a hand over the vintage black leather of his Mustang. Bobby fought to stay present, he fought his own mind, it wanted him to believe this was some phantasmic event. But it wasn't. She had a knife. She said "Remember I can slit your interior jugular without even reaching. Not that it will ever come to that." She soothed.

"Where do you want to go?" he asked on tenterhooks. There was an ache in his pants where her hand had been. He wanted to castrate himself.

"I'm not as high maintenance as you think darling." Her words were oddly warm, "As long as we can be together." She ran two fingers through his hair, the remaining three still clenched the knife, the cold steel of the handle brushed his ear.

He started the car. "Can you put that down." He glanced at her anxiously. "I can't drive like this."

And just then his phone rang and Bobby knew in that instant it was now or never. He reached down and fumbled for the device in the pocket of his door.

"Let it ring." she barked in agitation. He didn't listen. He wasn't going to a second location with this psycho. Nicole was as perverse and volatile a concoction as he'd ever seen. Something was off in her. It always had been, but now she was just one big glaring inconsistency.

His fingers fumbled and grasped and _finally_ settled on another rectangular device, one with a little more heft then his phone. He pulled it out and slammed it against her thigh with a speed and certainty he never had in his life. And she screeched and flailed. And stabbed wildly cutting his forearm before dropping the knife. And he slammed enough volts of electricity into her deranged body to incapacitate her.

Then he handcuffed her.

Then he taped her mouth.

Quietly, Quickly. Efficiently.

With his blood dripping rhythmically onto his pants soaking his cuff, with his chest heaving, with cold sweat beading at his brow he slid her seat all the way back and shoved her down beneath the dash. She lay there crumpled and unconscious on the floor like garbage. And because this had always been the plan he piled a laundrette's worth of blankets over her inert form.

Then he put the car in drive and pulled away at an even 15MPH.


	41. Chapter 41

He was calming down now.

His vitals were regulating.

His seized muscles released.

He glanced over at the lump on the floor.

She wasn't moving.

He pulled into a Burger King parking lot and peeled back the blankets slowly, all the while reminding himself that she was insane and feral and that her stillness might be an act. He reminded himself that if she got the upper hand he was dead. He had no doubt she would slit his throat, Nicole didn't make idle threats.

But still, he had to know.

He pressed two trembling bloody fingers to the pulse point on her neck holding the Taser in his other hand at the ready. It was there, the steady _thump thump thump_ and on closer inspection there was the slow rise and fall of her chest. Bobby didn't know how long he had. He imagined her eyelids lifting, then memories marching across her face, then he saw her becoming a snarling, biting, spitting nightmare that hurled herself at him and ran them off the road. _**Maybe I should put her in the trunk.**_ His mind was wild, his eyes darting about. **_Right Goren, you can do that in the drive thru lineup. Or why not ask the some patrons for a hand with your kidnapping._** He gave his head a shake and pulled back into traffic. But he couldn't quell his mind, it was a cacophony of images and ideas - some paranoid, some frightened, some soothing…

* * *

_**"I know where she is." He pulled the thought from nowhere. "I know how to get Nicole."**_

_**"Share. **__**Right now.**_" Alex sat up on her knees and leaned forward over their rumpled hedonistic retreat: an empty Rosé bottle lying on it's side, a half eaten jar of olives with the lid off and bread crumbs liberally sprinkled over a heap of rugs and linens. 

_**Bobby sighed and shook his head lost in the sheer volume of his stupidity, the scope of his blindness. Of course! Of course Nicole would be there. She would go to that place, the only place that epitomized family for him. She knew it existed she had referenced in more then one interrogation. And her campaign of evil, it was all about children and mothers and books and literature. He remembered her video and her reference to Mommie Dearest, they'd assumed she meant Alex, but no, that dig - about a twisted abusive mother - had been directed at Frances Goren. And that bouquet that vile gift they'd received the very evening they had returned from Aruba those flowers of purple and yellow and white they were the colours on the logo and letterhead of...**_

_**A small soft hand cupped his wrist, Alex pulled him back from his unwelcome epiphanies and self-flagellation.**_

_**"Bobby. Come back to me." she urged gently. And the diffuse light of his contemplation narrowed to a crisp pinhole focus on her.**_

_**"Carmel Ridge. She's at Carmel Ridge." he said grimly.**_

_**"You're sure?"**_

_**And he took Alex on the journey of bread crumbs and tidbits that Nicole had spread over the path of their travails. And he could see his wife working back over all of it, and he could see recognition dawning over and over. "Obviously she's moved around and we moved with her, but her home base…" He jumped up and was on the phone in an instant. Never mind that it was after midnight, never mind that the night duty nurse was surly and uncooperative.**_

_**"This is a job for administration. Office hours are between 9am and 6pm Monday to Friday." she droned again and again in his ear.**_

_**"Look lady," he railed "my mother Frances Goren was a patient, a resident there for 9 and a half years. I know how you work, I know what you can and can't do, just go into the system and check for a Nicole Wallace or a Melissa Baird or a Sarah Martin."**_

_**"Did you say your mother was Frances Goren?" The tired voice clarified.**_

_**"Yes."**_

_**"We don't have a Sarah Martin but we do have a Sarah Goren." She offered, "And I could lose my job for th…"**_

_**He had already hung up. He turned to Alex his eyes glowing. "We've got her."**_

_**"That stupid bitch." Alex muttered**_

_**"Well that's it!" Bobby's voice was triumphant. "Now we just need to close the net. We need to call Westchester County PD now. They'll be better then White Plains and the feds…"**_

_**But she stepped in front of him gravely and stemmed the flow of words. Alex was petite and perfect standing there in the wee small hours, wearing only a black bra and panties with appealingly disheveled hair that had long ago (during their kissing and tussling and intense lovemaking) come loose from her bun. In the glow of their living room she was golden and dewy and he wanted her again. He fought to tame his restless anatomy and listen to her words.**_

_**"Wait." She said softly, "Wait."**_

_**"What?"**_

_**"Do we want to go that way?"**_

_**His gaze narrowed on her, his head tilted as he considered what she hadn't said.**_

_**"Do we want to turn her over to the system and trust that they'll get it right this time?" The irony of her mistrust was not lost on him.**_

_**"What do you propose?" he asked.**_

_**She reached down and threaded her fingers through his, first her left hand through his right, then her right through his left. She pressed their palms together. She looked deep into his eyes. "We agree that she will never stop, don't we?"**_

_**"Yes."**_

_**"We agree that we need to protect our daughter, don't we?"**_

_**"With our lives." he said.**_

_**"Then we have to go and get her. We have to keep Nicole out of the system."**_

_**"Alex… " his eyes pled with hers, he didn't know if they could go down this road.**_

_**"Bobby." her gaze pled back and never wavered.**_

_**"We're talking about murder."**_

_**"Bobby she is going to kill me." And the most disturbing thing was the resignation in her voice. His troubled eyes panned her face. And what he saw there changed everything in an instant. He saw that Alex, at some point during their plight, had come to terms with leaving. He had seen this look before. He had seen this physical/spiritual disconnection before. He had seen it in the eyes of his terminally ill mother. The certainty of death. A sad but serene acceptance. "I don't want to leave you. I don't want to leave Immy." Her eyes glistened in the lamplight.**_

_**Alex was tough. Alex was a third generation cop. Alex had faced death and she had even delivered it, but she knew that she couldn't fight the likes of Nicole Wallace. She knew it deep inside her soul where she had searched endlessly for a solution. Nicole didn't have a conscience. Nicole wouldn't confront her with integrity. Nicole would steal up behind her on a crowded city street. Nicole was not tethered to morality or to society or to rule of law. Nicole was free range evil and she could be anywhere at anytime. To Alex that was the definition of futility. Alex had looked into her future and she knew with absolute certainty that it was short.**_

_**Bobby pulled her in tight, so tight, flesh against flesh. All of her warm sharp angles dug and prodded and even hurt him a little. But he needed to feel her heart beating against him. He wasn't in denial anymore. "She will never hurt you. I will never let her hurt you. I'll die first." He insisted. Then with new strength he said, "You're right. This has to end. She has to end. I choose us. Don't ever doubt that I choose us."**_

* * *

He pulled onto the freeway and pressed the accelerator to the floor. He needed to make time. Then he remembered that he was transporting a bound unconscious woman and lifted his foot off the pedal like it was on fire. The car slowed dramatically, too dramatically. _**No wait that won't do.**_ He reached over and set the cruise control to a precise three miles over the limit. His cruise control option was a Lewis retrofit. 1967 was the first year the Ford Motor Company had offered cruise control in their Mustang line. He was currently in a 1967 Ford Mustang Convertible, but his sweet shiny black baby hadn't come equipt. It was funny that only 55 units were built with the cruise control option that year, so actually finding one was like winning an automotive lottery. Then in a idiosyncratic move Ford made the option standard on Mustang's from 1970 through 78, but it was gone again by 79. _**Huh.**_

And so his mind went on circling the drain, dribbling forth the factoids and minutia that he had gathered over a lifetime. It was a coping mechanism. And an unwitting insanity defence. If a cop pulled him over with this shackled shrew lying fetally on his floor, at this rate he could Rainman his way into a mental observation ward.

He kept driving.

Roaring up the 209N, counting every moment Nicole stayed unconscious as a blessing, as a sign that the angels were on his side. It was a horrifyingly grim and achingly lonely drive. But this was the plan. And he was all about the plan. He held onto his agreement with Alex like a life preserver in the Atlantic. His arm hurt. It burned. He had a first aid kit in the glove compartment but he preferred to let his shirt be a makeshift bandage. It had already plastered and hardened and formed a seal over the gash so he knew it had stopped bleeding. He didn't want the radio on, he wanted to listen for the barest hint of stirring beneath that blanket. So all he had for company on this drive were memories of Alex and their dark pact. His tortured mind tumbled back...

* * *

**_He had carried her to bed an hour ago. And because she was every ounce a woman (his woman) she had giggled at the romantic gesture and clung to his broad shoulders. Yes, Alexandra Goren freely giggled now because she had finally found and embraced the silly, loveswept version of herself._**

**_"I don't want you to go there alone." She whispered to him in the dark of their bedroom._**

**_"I have to." He said back in low tones._**

**_"You need back up. Let me back you up." That suggestion was as natural to them as breathing._**

**_"No. You need to be with Immy, just in case."_**

**_"In case what?" Dread propelled her upward and she sat in the centre of the bed._**

**_"Alex we know this might end badly. It might be a trap. But she's less likely to try and hurt me."_**

**_"No." She said firmly imagining the worst case scenario as a slideshow across her mind. What if Nicole was waiting for him with a poison or a knife. _**_What if,_**_ Alex thought, _**_my bullet is the only thing between life and death for him and I'm not there._**_ "No." she said again firmly, they would always be partners. And rule number one was that you always had your partners back._**

**_"It won't work any other way." He compelled her to see. "Nicole needs to come with me of her own free will. I can't incapacitate her in a crowded facility. And I can't arrest her."_**

**_"I can arrest her. Or at least pretend to."_**

**_"No Alex, no." Now he was unyielding. "I don't want you anywhere near her."_**

**_In the absolute darkness she bit her lip. Agitation made her muscles jump beneath her skin. She felt her knees pulse uncontrollably, her biceps twitch. "Maybe we should just screw it all and lay in wait. A sharpshooter, one between the eyes." she whispered a horrific sweet nothing to him._**

**_She knew he was shaking his head even in the blackness. "I want answers. We both need closure before it's done."_**

**_He was right having Nicole allocute would make life afterward so much simpler. Knowing they had heard her confess. Hearing her list the full roster of her kills. Knowing that they hadn't just been speculative vigilantes. They needed to hear how she had torn Tamara to shreds and injected Declan, how she had pushed Frank head first into a concrete alley and strung up Croyden… And dispensed with who knew how many other truly innocent victims._**

**_"You know I'm right." Bobby's hand lingered on her bare arm. "She needs to tell us everything so we can live with ourselves."_**

**_"How…. how will you get her to come with you?"_**

**_"I'll do whatever it takes." he said vaguely and the sheets rustled under his restless limbs._**

**_Alex huffed. She knew what that meant. "She wants you. She has always wanted you and you're going to wrap yourself up like a gift."_**

**_"Maybe she just wants my allegiance."_**

**_"She wants your body." Alex fired harshly. "But maybe that's okay with you."_**

**_In a second he had flipped over and slammed her back into the pillows. He mounted her roughly his big body spreading her thighs painfully wide. She choked on the impact, the air flying out of her diaphragm. She couldn't see him clearly but she feel the heat of his face an inch from hers._**

**_"It's not okay with me." His voice was sinister._**

**_But Alex felt like pushing the envelope. "Maybe I'm giving my consent for you to both do what you've always wanted to do."_**

**_He grabbed both her wrists in one thick hand and pinned them over her head "You say this to me even after tonight?" he demanded "Even after what we shared? I have never been as close to another human being as I am to you. I have never loved anyone as much as I love you."_**

**_"So I'm supposed to give you a loophole in your vows." she growled "Go ahead and fuck a serial killer the ends justify the means?"_**

**_"She disgusts me. I wouldn't even be able to get it up." he ground down to show her just how 'up' he was for her. She wrapped her legs around his waist and applied rib crushing pressure. He groaned and his grip on her hands faltered. She snaked them free, planted her feet and bucked him off._**

**_Now straddling him she shook her head, "Men are so naive." She said with all the superiority of a woman on top, of a student of human nature, of a wife. She pinned his hands above his head._**

**_"So you want to do what then? Call local PD afterall?"_**

**_Damn him. Damn him and his Goddamn fucking logic. She sat there on his stomach so torn._**

**_"Alex?"_**

**_Her sigh was gusty. "Fine. D_****_o what you have to do._**" her voice was clipped "**_I don't want to know._**" Her gut jumped with pain and burned as she said it. 

**_Alex was an inch away from grabbing him and Immy and taking off for Timbuktu. _****_That would be the only way to be free. If they wanted to live a normal life on a planet where Nicole Wallace was alive they would have to hide. Desperation clawed at Alex. She didn't want to proceed with this disgusting plan and yet how could they go on without it? Live in fear? Stunt their daughter's growth by limiting her freedom and exposure to the world? Alex keenly remembered words she had said to Nicole years ago:_**

_'And you know what that's called, your being an expert on the modern American novel and all.'_

_'Well I never much cared for Heller.'_

**_Alex reached back and took off her bra and then folded forward mashing her nipples into his chest for maximum contact._**

**_"I'll play it by ear." Bobby spoke into her hair. "I just need to get her to the car."_**

**_"She has to walk out with you." Alex gripped his sides sliding her body subtly against him for friction._**

**_"Uh huh." His hands slid down the smooth fine contour of her back._**

**_"She'll expect you to be pretty friendly." She bit his neck._**

**_"This is war. You have to trust me to do this for us and not betray you." He curled and kissed the ball of her shoulder._**

**_"It's Nicole I don't trust. Vicious bitch. You're going to have to act your ass off." her voice was an icy contrast to her hot pliable body. "Get close, touch her, kiss her." The words sounded like hate speech on her tongue._**

**_He cupped her ass in both hands. "It might not come to that." he muttered letting his fingers stroke between her thighs._**

**_That set her off. She sat up and grabbed his shoulders harshly, putting all of her weight on them sinking him deep into the bedding "Let's cut the bullshit. All she knows is sex and murder. If Nicole goes anywhere with you it will be after 12 rounds of sexual manipulation."_**

**_"Alex…"_**

**_"Admit it." She shook him hard. "Admit it!" She yelled loudly breaking the peace and startling them both. "Don't lie to me or yourself!"_**

**_"She'll be sexual." he conceded, "Very sexual. But i'll play her and then i'll get the drop on her in the car."_**

**_Now Alex settled, she lay back down against his chest._**

**_"Rememba Cookie Caspari?" She said it like she'd just stepped out of hair salon in Bensonhurst. He did remember. Vividly. That was how it was with them. Such was their preternatural connection. 3 words and the plan was set._**

**_And then her panties were sliding down around her thighs and she was kissing him in a barely controlled frenzy. Her hot lips over every inch of him like a branding iron, branding him hers._**

**_Murder as foreplay._**

* * *

Bobby pulled the Mustang up a slight incline and along a winding wooded path. The trees were so thick here it was like being dropped in the Amazon. But no, there weren't etched paths and log cabins in that uncharted South American jungle. This was definitely upstate New York. And there probably wasn't this exact genus of fir tree in the Amazon jungle either. This was definitely the southern edge of the Catskill mountain range (Sundown, New York to put a fine point on it). And that woman over there leaning against a Honda Accord waiting patiently in the waning daylight, she wasn't a member of that famed namesake - that all female warrior tribe (_**though she could have taught them a thing or two)**_ - it was Alex.

She had beat him here.

2 hours on the road and it all came down to this.

Declan's cabin.


End file.
